


Dissidere

by Sunnepho



Category: Dissidia: Final Fantasy
Genre: Adventure, F/M, Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-22
Updated: 2011-10-10
Packaged: 2017-10-24 11:40:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 38,545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/263053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunnepho/pseuds/Sunnepho
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The war has ended, and Cosmos' Warriors have returned to the places in which they belong. But this is Dissidia, and it is never over. - Ignores DFF012. Slash and het pairings will exist, but will not be the focus.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Reverse Gaia

**Author's Note:**

> **Dissidere**  
>  Sunnepho
> 
> Disclaimer: Dissidia Final Fantasy and all characters and settings are the property of Square Enix. No profit is made or intended from the writing of this fiction.
> 
> I've been planning this fanfiction for a while now, and I know it's probably been done to death before, but I wanted to present my take on how to twist up space, time, causality, and all that fun stuff for an adventure story with a smattering of romance, but mostly a lot of melodrama, introspection, and sword fighting. Because this is Dissidia, and it is never over.
> 
> Be warned that there will be slash and het. And smack me if I start to take things too seriously.

Part 1. **Reverse Gaia**

" _I've thought of a wonderful present for you..."_

Cloud gripped his sword tighter.

And he hissed, eyes widening in horror. His hands were empty, painfully light when relieved of the Buster Sword's weight— _it's not heavy_ —and grasping at nothing.

" _Traitor..."_

He reached into the dry well of his MP reserves, throwing an arm forward. A weak, sputtering fireball shot forward, dwindling as he watched, and sparked out.

" _I am your reason!"_

* * *

Cloud shot up to his feet, the comforting heft of the Buster in his right hand. A thin trickle of sweat ran down his neck, cold against his skin.

Another nightmare.

He let out the breath he'd been holding and rubbed his free hand over his gritty eyes. He looked around the room at the contours of practical, unembellished furniture bathed in a faint green glow of mako-shot eyes. Same as always.

In the first years since Meteor, he had travelled the Planet as if Nibel wolves were snapping at his heels. He had hired out his services (mercenaries, Zack had said) at first, but then people started recognizing him, the job offers changed, and he balked.

It wasn't as if he needed the gil, anyway.

He spent his time up north after that, stalking through the Ancients' city and killing monsters in the snow fields, and his friends thought he was going mad. He hadn't stopped moving for a moment after Meteor, they said. He hadn't come to terms.

He didn't know how to respond to that. What else could he do but fight?

And then it happened.

He couldn't explain what it was. Planet, he could barely remember what it was. _It_ had happened, and he was back, and all that was left over were fragments of visions filled with bright colours and dangling beads, half-remembered screams, helpless nightmares, and a blinding headache behind his eyes when he tried to think about it.

He had come out of it, though. And he felt lighter. He bought a small house in Kalm, put a stand for the Buster sword beside his bed, and his friends had stopped haranguing him. The people in Kalm had gotten used to his presence once he didn't do anything worth noticing for a few months. Cid had nodded, that horrible dog-end in the corner of his mouth, and pronounced him "too damn skinny, but alright." Settled.

He didn't tell them about the nightmares.

Cloud didn't move.

The blue and white curtains (a gift from Yuffie, who also tried to hang banners of Leviathan from his walls) at his window hung flat, as if lead weights dangled from their ends, and the dead air was stifling, quiet like a storm was bearing down.

Ha, how dramatic. Just because he'd been dreaming about _him_ again—

Cloud's breath rasped in his lungs. He was at the window in two quick strides, he pushed aside the curtain, looked down at the street, and he wasn't surprised, because he knew.

A dark figure stood there, head tilted up toward his window, looking like a shadow cut out of the night.

Moonlight shot through a short gap in the roiling clouds, lighting up a flash of silvery hair and pale, luminous green eyes, and he launched himself out of the window. He _knew_.

Steel clashed against unyielding steel, throwing sparks up into the muggy air. Cloud slashed upward, diagonally under the figure's shoulder, but he was blocked with ease. Using the force of the parry to swing himself around into a hack against the other shoulder, he felt the whistle of shifting blade, ducked under as he disengaged smoothly, and lunged to plant the hilt of the Buster in the figure's rib cage. A hand slammed against his elbow and knocked him reeling backward as the figure stumbled a few steps away.

Cloud stood back, sword raised to guard, and he wondered.

The other hadn't taken the offensive once.

Cloud's eyes were slitted instinctively, almost shut to prevent the glow of his mako eyes from giving up his exact position in the dark. From the glint of green that seemed to flit in and out of his sight, his visitor was doing the same. And yet, he did not attack.

Quietly, Cloud said, "Sephiroth."

* * *

He looked the same, Cloud thought. Aloof as always and somehow too large of a presence to comfortably fit in Cloud's tiny kitchen. The lamps flickered once overhead. They ran on solar power now, charging throughout the day, but it had been overcast for several days now, and Cloud did not tap into the rapidly diminishing mako power grid that still stretched beneath their feet.

Sephiroth was watching the magnetic-backed clock attached to the fridge with idle interest. It had been Tifa's idea of a birthday gift: a dancing bubble marked the passage of seconds while two models of dolphins pointed to the hour and minute. Cloud had not wanted to let the man into his house. It was only when light flooded the street from a neighbour's open window that Cloud stepped back to his door, where an overhang blocked him from view from above. He'd picked the lock easily. He'd locked himself out on several occasions before, when he'd thought he felt... well, _him_ , and dashed out through the upper storey window. He'd glanced back at Sephiroth, who had lowered his blade, but otherwise stood still, ignoring the wide eyes staring at him from other houses, and Cloud had jerked his head inwards once before walking away, leaving the door open for Sephiroth to follow.

The Soldier hadn't said anything about Jenova so far, and Cloud was taking that to be a positive sign.

Then again, he hadn't said anything at all. The Buster Sword leaned against the side of the kitchen table, within easy reach.

"Sephiroth." Cloud's voice sounded coarse to him, breaking the stillness of the tableau.

The man fixed him with an impenetrable look. "Strife."

Cloud frowned. "I'm not your Soldier."

Sephiroth's stare wavered, and he looked almost confused. "My apologies. My memories... are not clear as they should be."

"What do you remember?" Cloud said, trying to keep the hesitation from his voice. If he remembered, then... His hand twitched, and he quickly dropped it to his lap, although there was no doubt that Sephiroth had noticed him refrain from reaching for his sword.

"I remember... Nibelheim."

Cloud gripped the hilt of the Buster now, uncaring if Sephiroth saw it as a threat.

"I remember looking up at you while I fell toward the mako," Sephiroth said, unconcerned and staring at him unblinkingly. "And then I remember looking up at you again, like I was at the bottom of a dark pit, and you had a sword that glowed blue." His eyes flickered to Cloud's white-knuckled grip on the Buster Sword. "After that, I am not sure. There was... a red demon, and a grey land that stretched out with no sun in the sky. And again, I remember you."

"You remember slaughtering my mother, then," Cloud said, his chest tight and still.

Sephiroth did not respond, watching him steadily. A shadow crossed his eyes.

"You remember Jenova!"

Cloud was on his feet now, anger boiling through his veins. Sephiroth did not move, face as blank as ever, and Cloud would have leapt across the table at him but for his eyes. It was strange. Foreign. But Cloud had seen this kind of pain and emptiness before, in the other place.

"I remember a voice in my head. I remember rage, and fire. And then it was gone, and I looked up to see you, approaching me in the centre of the world. You killed me. And I woke up in the grey land."

The quiet voice sapped away Cloud's rage, leaving confusion and weariness behind.

"Why are you here?"

Sephiroth was silent for so long that Cloud thought he would not answer, and then he said, "I expect that I do not have a response that would satisfy you. When I found myself back on the Planet, I tried to contact Zack—"

"Zack's dead."

Silence stretched out again. "I see."

When Sephiroth looked up again and opened his mouth, Cloud could see the words forming before they were spoken, and he spun, knocking over his stool and stalking away and up his staircase so that the kitchen door slammed on Sephiroth's words.

"I am sorry, Cloud."

* * *

The man was still sitting in the kitchen the next morning when Cloud couldn't ignore the presence in his house anymore.

He entertained a slightly hysterical thought that perhaps he should offer his guest breakfast, but discarded it. He wasn't going to be able to force any food down his throat, anyway, so there was no point in just feeding Sephiroth as if he was the man's mother. Cloud suppressed a nasty thought about Sephiroth and his mother, and he ignored him, crossing to his counter to start a pot of coffee.

He ground his beans quickly, thankful for the noise to distract him from his hyperaware nerves. Dumping them into a filter, he filled the machine with water, leaned forward to press the switch, and he stumbled, images stabbing into his eyes.

A blonde woman smiled at him dryly, a whip looped and hanging from her side. A long table stood in front of him, covered tureens wafting the scent of eggs and some sticky jam. The noise was overwhelming, roaring like a waterfall in his ears. He thought he might have heard a voice he recognized, so he strained to filter out the noise, and he thought the sticky sensation may have been his eardrums rupturing...

" _Cloud!_ "

There was a hand on his arm, gripping his elbow.

He looked up through the black spots dancing around his vision and focused on the wisps of long silver-white hair and the glowing green eyes.

Gasping for breath, Cloud let Sephiroth heave him to a standing position and dug his fingers into his arms until the swaying stopped.

"Did you see something?"

Cloud glanced up sharply. The question was too pointed to be a guess.

"Have you been seeing things, too?"

Sephiroth nodded. "Glimpses of another world, perhaps."

"Do you recognize anything?"

"Not at all."

Cloud scowled, trying to reach through his memory. "I think I heard a familiar voice, but..." He shook his head, huffing a tired breath.

Cloud looked down at the large hand still clasped around his arm, and he stared pointedly until Sephiroth rolled his eyes and let go, turning away to reclaim his seat at the kitchen table.

The gesture was oddly normal for the most feared man on the Planet.

Cloud flicked on the coffee maker, leaned against the counter, and watched Sephiroth watch the clock again.

When Sephiroth spoke again, there was a distinct tinge of frustration in his voice. "That clock runs slow. It will be one second off in two days."

Cloud eyed him warily for signs of mental deterioration. "And this... bothers you."

Sephiroth's eyes flicked to him and back. "Does it not bother you?"

Cloud reached out slowly, took the clock off the fridge, removed the batteries, and placed it face down on top of the appliance. He offered a half-shrug when Sephiroth looked at him. "I know what time it is," he said, as if that was an explanation.

The coffee machine spluttered warningly, and he reached into a cupboard and took down two mugs. Sephiroth accepted a mug readily, and when Cloud placed the milk on the table next to the sugar bowl, the Soldier had already tossed at least three lumps into his coffee.

Cloud's eyebrows crawled up into his spikes. The General liked his coffee black and sickening sweet.

The domestic scene felt utterly surreal.

"This is much better than Shinra coffee," Sephiroth said, and Cloud wondered if he should take it as a compliment.

The Masamune was leaning against a counter, out of Sephiroth's immediate reach, and Cloud knew it was a move calculated to reassure, just as he knew Sephiroth would be able to arm himself in the space of time it would take to blink.

Sephiroth was staring down into the curls of steam, though.

"About Zack," he said finally, "how—"

"I don't want to talk about it," Cloud interrupted.

Sephiroth gave him a look that made his shoulders tense until they creaked, but he nodded curtly.

"Sorry," Cloud found himself saying. "Maybe later."

Sephiroth nodded again, after a while.

And it was an uneasy truce.

* * *

Cloud was surprised by how easily Sephiroth settled into his life. He kept to himself, offering information on his visions and asking sharp questions about Cloud's. He vanished without a trace when Cloud's friends appeared to drag Cloud out to have a drink or show him a new chocobo someone had been breeding. It was their method of checking up on him, he supposed. They hadn't gotten used to him answering his PHS and not being busy hacking a monster to pieces when they called, yet. When Cloud begged off, citing uproarious drunkenness that he could act out quite well until he stepped into the quiet of his house, Sephiroth would be there again, a glass of water set out for him and the same unimpressed look on his face.

And either Sephiroth was good at hiding it, or Cloud had visions far more often than he did, and they seemed to be increasing in frequency.

They didn't seem to make much more sense than before, though now he felt as if he had simply stepped into the other world, able to see and interact with objects. He had not seen a person since the blonde woman with the whip.

They were sitting on Cloud's couch as he half-heartedly watched a news feature on New Shinra's efforts to clean up the Midgar area (Reeve looked frazzled under the reporter's rapid questioning), when Sephiroth shifted and let his head fall back onto the worn upholstery behind him.

Cloud muted the programme.

He had learned to read Sephiroth more in the past few weeks, although he wasn't entirely sure if some of it wasn't Zack's influence. He could tell when Sephiroth was exasperated or more often bored by the smallest changes in his eyes. Displeasure was easy because he didn't bother trying to hide it, but it was rare, and even rarer was the tiny tilt at the corner of his mouth, a far cry from the cruel smirks that the Sephiroth he remembered used to give him.

And the most obvious tell was the way he said Cloud's name. "Strife" was back, stiff and formal, when he was feeling harried or distracted. He would call him "Cloud" more often than not, the syllable sharp and without inflection, unlike the way Sephiroth would draw out the name, rolling it around his tongue when he was feeling particularly vindictive. And when Cloud saw something, and the painful pressure slammed down on his head again, Sephiroth would reach out for him immediately, his name ringing out with true fear underlying it.

It was strange to think that Sephiroth feared for him, and Cloud could not understand why he _cared_.

He watched him sometimes, puzzling thoughts tasting of tin on the back of his tongue, but he did not ask.

Sephiroth was worried now, staring up at the ceiling with a thin crease between his brows.

Cloud sat in the silence and waited.

"Why am I here?" he said finally.

"What?"

"Why am I alive when I clearly remember dying, even though I remember so little else?" Sephiroth turned to look at him. "Does it have something to do with these visions of another world?"

"I... think so," Cloud said. "I think there is something that we need to do."

Sephiroth gave him an amused glance. "Like destiny, Cloud? Really?"

He shrugged, and it was when he opened his mouth, maybe to give a defensive retort, when the pain slammed into the back of his head again.

Growling and breathing through his mouth, Cloud pressed his fingers into his temples and raised his head, and what he saw felt like a punch to his stomach.

A man with dark hair falling messily around the scar cut into his forehead and nose was hunched in front of him, clutching at his head as he raised it up. Their eyes met, mako blue and slate widening simultaneously in recognition.

Cloud could only stare, frozen and blank, until the vision flickered and vanished like a snuffed candle, leaving Sephiroth's acid green eyes peering down at him. He hadn't been wearing his armour or his gloves for a while, and his hands were pleasantly cool around Cloud's wrists.

"What did you see?"

Cloud sucked in a few breaths of air greedily, pushing them deep as if he could shove down the anxiety in much the same way.

" _Squall_ ," he gasped finally. "I'm seeing into Squall's world. And he's seeing mine."

* * *

The visions quieted after that, as if satisfied that the message had been delivered. He was able to catch glimpses into Squall's world on occasion, but he hadn't seen the man again.

No matter, they had plenty to worry about.

"You are certain you cannot recall exactly where you met Squall? Or how to get there?"

Cloud bit back a growl. "No. I've told you everything I can remember. I only know he is a friend. A comrade. I know his name. We fought together in the other place. But I can't tell you where this other place is, or how I got there or back. You were _there_."

"I remember even less than you."

"You seemed to have all of your memories while you were there. You certainly enjoyed taunting me about what I didn't know and what my purpose was."

Sephiroth was looking at him, but he looked more like he was staring through him. "Perhaps," he said slowly, "the person I was then knew just as I do now that you represented some key to who I was or what purpose I was to serve. I knew that you were important."

Cloud didn't know how to respond to that.

The green eyes focused on him, and Sephiroth waved a hand dismissively. "Or perhaps you provoked me."

Cloud thought he would have attacked the man if his words hadn't sounded so oddly like a joke. He shook his head. "Never mind that. The question is, if we're connecting to other worlds, who could be causing that, and who would stand to gain from it?"

The answer dangled tantalizingly out of reach, inextricably tangled with the lost memories.

They did not have the luxury to think long upon the mystery, however. The news reports had gotten steadily more frantic.

There had been a sharp rise in sightings of strange, mutated monsters. Ark dragons with wingspreads of several feet and a paralyzing screech had been joined by Allemagnes, and Cloud was certain he had never seen those outside of the Northern Crater. At first, the monsters would hide near the Mythril Mines, ambushing lone travellers, but as their numbers increased, swarms had crept closer to human villages.

The same phenomenon was occurring all over the Planet. Grossly proportioned monsters and ones breeding outside of their natural habitat attacked any prey they could easily find, and they were getting bolder.

The smash of collapsing gates had Cloud on his feet and sprinting down into the village square with sword in hand long before the screaming began.

"Always the middle of the night," he groused, taking a ready stance and casting a quick fire spell to illuminate the enemy.

He needn't have bothered. Huge horns silhouetted against the stars rose up and dropped sharply as the King Behemoth reared. The blasted thing didn't bother to hide, and was too big to do so in any case. Shrieking, it dug in its hooves and charged at him.

Cloud leapt out of the way, landing a heavy slash on the beast's side and cringing when it howled. It charged at him again, and a multitude of slashes scored into its other flank, the Masamune only visible from the blurred flashes of reflected light.

The Behemoth spun, its tail whirring around like a mace, and Cloud flung himself backward to avoid the spikes.

How much HP did the bastard have, anyway?

Cloud reached inside of him and _shoved_ , and his sword glowed bright orange. Leaping straight up in to the air, he charged blade first, first stabbing through the monster's skull before pulling back and cleaving straight downwards.

The Behemoth staggered, its head pouring green blood, and it collapsed in a heap. Starting slowly, as if with great reluctance, and then gathering speed, its body disintegrated, throwing a foul smell out onto the wind.

"I have never seen a King Behemoth in Kalm, before," Sephiroth said behind him.

Cloud turned and looked at him. A spray of green blood was clinging to the man's long hair, and he was wiping at another splatter across his cheek with an expression of resigned distaste.

"Yeah, me neither. I wonder. It can’t be natural."

The corner of Sephiroth's lips twisted, and he opened his mouth as if to speak.

This time, when the pressure hit, they both winced and curled around their heads. There was a heavy sensation, as if they were already laminated against a wall, but something was trying to force them even further into it, and Cloud began to gasp for breath. The pressure felt like it had collapsed his lungs. He pushed back against it, not sure if he was pushing physically or with his mind.

And then, just as suddenly, it was gone.

Cloud was on his hands and knees, retching as his airway rubbed against itself as it inflated.

There was a new voice, groaning as if in pain.

He looked up at the person sprawled in front of him.

The first thing he saw was the tail, curled around like it was trying to shield itself. He saw the brightly coloured clothing, flaring out at the leg, and he saw the golden hair.

"Zidane?"

* * *

Zidane was feeling much better once Cloud had dragged him into his house and forced some water down his throat, as evidenced by the way he was hanging by his tail from the banister of the staircase.

"Wow! Everything looks so... made! What's this do?"

The lights flicked on and off.

"What kind of magic lamps do you have? They light so quickly!"

"Zidane."

"What's this box? Do you have your Tetra Master cards in here? Whoa, what are these glowing spheres? Are they some kind of treasure?"

"Zidane!"

The boy looked up guiltily, a materia in each hand.

"Do you know what happened? How you got here?"

Zidane hopped up onto the arm of the sofa, tossing a Contain materia up into the air and catching it again.

"Oh yeah. I've seen this before. It's like when Terra and Gaia tried to merge. Someone is trying to force two worlds to occupy the same space, like Garland did."

"Perhaps Garland is the force behind our worlds colliding, then?" Sephiroth mused.

A chill snapped through the air, the beginnings of a Freeze spell, and Sephiroth snatched the materia away from Zidane with an icy glare.

Zidane stared at his empty fingers, perplexed. "What was that? I felt Mist in that sphere."

"It was a spell," Cloud said. "And please don't touch any of my materia until we know you're not going to use it against us by accident."

Zidane attempted to look contrite. He leaned in closer to Cloud. "Why are you hanging around with one of Chaos' warriors, anyway?" he said quietly.

"Chaos?" Cloud's fingers dug into the cushions. Images pounded into his head. Golden Cosmos. Fiery Chaos. He blanched. He remembered the war, and judging by Sephiroth's expression, he did as well.

Tension stretched between them as Cloud stared at Sephiroth, wondering if he would be able to reach the Buster Sword before Sephiroth spitted him like a pig. He searched Sephiroth's eyes for hostility as they flickered.

"I was never loyal to Chaos," Sephiroth said lowly, so that Zidane had to strain to hear.

“Looked like it.” Cloud’s knuckles were white.

“Uh, guys...” Zidane said, glancing back and forth.

“Naturally. Your judgement has been nothing but laudable, if memory serves.” Sephiroth’s voice was soft and flat, but acid-green eyes glittered, brittle.

“You—!” Cloud surged to his feet, a hand swinging out to his weapon, and he barely registered the crash of a lamp toppling to the ground. He heard Zidane shout his name. He raised the Buster, glaring down at the seated Soldier, and he paused.

Sephiroth had the Masamune balanced in one hand, poised defensively. He hadn’t moved otherwise.

It was the furious jump to Sephiroth’s jaw that made Cloud hesitate.

“You...” Cloud scowled. “You’re angry. Why?”

Sephiroth narrowed his eyes.

“Why would you care?” Cloud continued, after a moment. “You act as if I accuse you. Unjustly.”

“I would be pleased to fight you anytime you wished, Cloud.” Sephiroth stood, staring down at him. “But it will not be on anyone’s terms but ours. I am no pawn, controlled by the dangle of memories before me.”

“Oi!” Zidane waved an arm between them. “You’re _both_ idiots! Why do you _have_ to fight?”

There was a long, terse moment, and then the clunk of the Buster Sword lowering to tap on the ground was loud in the silence.

Sephiroth’s eyes flitted to Zidane. “Hmm,” he said, and a corner of his mouth lifted. “Why not fight?”

Cloud’s jaw clenched and he looked away. “Not interested.”

Zidane looked as if he was about to protest again, but a whine sounded from down the hall.

"This climate does not agree with me!"

Kuja slunk into the room, fingers tugging ruefully at the spray of feathers standing at his hairline. "Look how dry my hair is, Zidane!"

Cloud knew his confusion must have been written plainly on his face because Zidane looked at him and grimaced.

"My brother," he said simply, shrugging his shoulders as if to say what-can-you-do.

* * *

TBC - Let's see what they're up to in FF3verse next!


	2. The Cloud Descends

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 2. **The Cloud Descends**
> 
> Disclaimer still applies.
> 
> I hope you like action 'cause there's not much else in here. XD
> 
> I will be following FF3DS canon because the characters have more personality. Also, I have taken liberties with the gameplay. ... Considerable liberties.

Squall lay on his back, hands clasped and pillowing his head.

Castle Sasune was drafty, and an insistent cold breeze was chilling his fingers despite the roaring fire in the grate.

There was a flurry of activity at the corner of his eye, a crash, and over the clatter of scattering crockery, there was a heartfelt groan.

"Bartz!" the Onion Knight protested.

"Sorry! It was an accident!"

Squall directed a baleful eye at the hyperactive youth, who was trying to chase down an earthenware plate before it rolled into the fire.

A musical giggle.

Squall huffed and swung his legs down off the bed. "Don't bother, kid," he said. "He'll always be a klutz."

The Onion Knight rolled his eyes. "My name is Luneth, you know. Not 'kid'."

Terra laughed again, covering her mouth with a thin hand. "It's alright, Luneth. Nothing is broken."

"Better not be. Princess Sara will have my head..."

Bartz flung himself down onto the bed next to Squall's, and a wayward flying boot narrowly missed his shoulder. "Don't let your girlfriend hear you talking about another woman like that!"

Luneth reddened like a Wisp. "Refia's not my girlfriend!"

"Sure seemed like it when she scolded you today. It was a labour of love!"

Luneth growled and crossed his arms, turning his back resolutely to Bartz. "I _refuse_ to let you provoke me, you oaf."

And over Bartz's raucous laughter, a rumble sounded from the far end of the room, sobering as a splash of icy water.

Bartz looked over cautiously, as if to see if there would be any further movement, but Exdeath was still and silent.

Bartz and Luneth exchanged an apprehensive glance, and much subdued, Bartz leaned forward to speak.

"So what, our worlds are merging?"

Luneth tapped a finger against his chin thoughtfully. "I believe so. Or at least leaking. You said you have been seeing into Cloud's world, right Squall? Before you came here?"

Squall nodded curtly. "And I think he was seeing me."

"I have been seeing a different world, as well," Terra said. "I did not see anyone I recognized, but it was beautiful despite the heavy Mist clinging to the land."

"And in each of our worlds, monsters have been going berserk and changing." Luneth thought for a while and shook his head, sighing. "Here, it almost looks as if the Dark and Light Crystals have fallen out of balance again, and it seems like the Dark world is overpowering the Light, but how can that be? My friends and I had restored the balance so recently..."

Bartz's head shot up, eyes sparkling as if he had been struck with an idea as bright as a chocobo feather. "What about your crystals?"

"Crystals?"

"Yes, you said they were sentient, right? Maybe they know something!"

Luneth gave Bartz a slow, thoughtful look that had him shrinking back. "What?" Bartz said defensively.

"That's actually a good idea."

"You don't have to sound so surprised!"

* * *

Terra had appeared first, rattled and alone. It was Cid who found her and brought her to Castle Sasune, because Cid had some sort of strange idea that Luneth was supposed to deal with mysterious strangers stepping half-dead through breaches in the universe. It was probably Refia's fault.

Not that he was complaining, really. He was glad to see Terra again. There had been an uneasy feeling in his gut for a while now, quite aside from the sudden pressures and the strange visions of dark forests and towering metal structures. If something was happening to his world, then it was quite conceivable that the same could be afflicting other worlds. Terra could have been in danger, and, well, he swore he would protect her, didn't he?

Squall was next. Luneth admired Squall to some extent, even if he kept his distance and called him "boy" all the time. It wasn't as if he was much older. No, what he admired about Squall was the way he could keep it all together and remain stoic despite having just hopped to another world altogether. Squall didn't even look confused (although Luneth did have his doubts about the long-term effects of keeping all his thoughts and emotions bottled up like that).

And then Bartz had showed up (the impact and the shouting still rang in his head), and behind him, dogging his every step, was the Chaos warrior Exdeath.

Luneth had switched to ninja class and kept his weapons close to hand for three full days, but Exdeath hadn't made a move against any of them. He ignored them, actually, but he was always there, and Luneth didn't want to attack him just for being an unknown quantity. He'd asked Bartz about it.

"Hmm, well, I kind of think he's gone back to just being a tree. And who knows what trees are thinking?"

Succinct. Leave it to Bartz.

It had taken them two days to set out for the caves near Ur, while the cooks piled them high with travel rations and Refia threatened to whack him with her hammer if he wasn't careful and died on her. It felt strange, setting out to seek out the crystals without his friends at his side, but Arc could not leave his job teaching books (and magic, when they protested long and hard) to the children in Sasune. Refia had returned to her apprenticeship, and Ingus's duty was to his people.

Sometimes they reminded him that he was the only who hadn't moved on.

Luneth led the way, Bartz chattered Terra's ear off, and Squall walked a little away from them, keeping an eye on Exdeath's trailing bulk. Misfits, all of them, he thought fondly.

They were travelling the grasslands just past the desert when Luneth stopped, looking about suspiciously. Bartz caught his eye, quiet and grim.

There it was again. A shuffling sound.

Luneth waved at the warriors, signalling that they should spread out. He drew his sword, and when the first Werewolf leapt at him, snarling, he was already slashing up and around.

He saw a flash of sunlight on steel and heard a bang. Squall had thrown a Revenant back, its rotting flesh squelching unpleasantly when it hit the ground. Two Werewolves lunged, and Squall's gunblade was a blur of movement.

A _whomp_ of Terra's fireball exploding on his other side distracted him for a moment, and Luneth staggered back, leaning out of reach of a Werewolf's claws scrabbling blindly at him while its jaw was impaled on his sword, forcing its head up and away. He ripped his sword away and hacked down at the monster's shoulder, its fur matted down with blood.

Bartz tumbled past behind him, easily dancing out of reach of an enraged Werewolf. Seeing his opening, he lunged in until the Brave Blade had sunk in to the hilt before jumping back out of reach again.

There were so many of them... Luneth blocked another clawing slash and shoved his sword into the beast's eye socket.

They were surrounded.

Luneth ducked under a Revenant's outstretched arm and rolled behind it before it noticed he was gone. He concentrated, and there was a flash of light under his feet as he switched jobs. Summoning up his HP and shearing a portion off the top to forcibly power up his blade, he _swung_.

Most of the enemies had been wounded already, and they fell under his Souleater immediately. The others were severely weakened, and quickly dispatched by the other warriors.

Luneth shifted back from his Dark Knight form, smiling at Terra in relief.

Terra's eyes widened, then. Her mouth opened in a soundless scream, and she pointed behind him.

Dread pooling in his stomach, Luneth spun around, raising his sword. He wasn't going to make it. He was too slow, he knew.

There was the slick sound of a blade parting flesh and a dull thud. Luneth looked down at the corpse of the Cyclops that had been sneaking up behind him, cleaved almost in half.

He looked up at Exdeath, wondering if those were eyes he could see in the slit in the helmet.

"Uh. Thanks," he said.

Exdeath turned away without giving the slightest indication of hearing him.

Well. That was different.

* * *

After Terra had healed everyone (she had been initially appalled that she would need to relearn her magic, but it quickly became obvious how enormously many eighth levels casts she had, and Luneth had given her all of his spells without hesitation before relearning his spare Curaja and Flare), they arrived at the Altar Caves without much further incident, although there had been a "What the heck is that!" moment when an enormously bloated Killer Bee chased Bartz half the length of the woods by Ur.

"So..." Bartz said doubtfully. "We have to fall down this hole."

"Yeah." It sounded stranger now that he thought about it.

"How do we get back up?"

"Well, the wind crystal usually warps me out."

Luneth resisted the urge to scratch the back of his head sheepishly. He hadn't come back to see the crystal since the first time he was transported in with his friends.

Squall shook his head. "Let's go." He leapt, vanishing quickly into the gloom.

Bartz pumped his fist. "Okay! Let's do this!" He jumped, shouting "look out below!"

Luneth rolled his eyes. What would he have done if Squall _had_ been standing directly under the hole? He peered down, braced his arms against the sides of the hole as he swung his legs down and dropped, landing lightly on the balls of his feet.

He wondered if he should offer to catch Terra, but she stepped down beside him out from a gentle float.

They looked up, and there was a flash of blue up above the hole, but no giant suit of armour descended.

Bartz looked at Luneth, and he shrugged.

"Think he's too big to fit down the hole?" Bartz suggested.

"Oh." Luneth looked up at the hole again. It was rather narrow. "Hey, uh, we'll go ahead and talk to the crystal, and then we'll come back for you, okay?" he called up.

There was no response for a moment, and then footsteps receded towards the entrance to the cave.

That was probably an 'okay'.

"Right. That way."

It may have been a feeling, or it may have been the lingering heat suffusing the cave, smelling of fire magic. Luneth sped up as he approached the room housing the crystal's platform, Onion Sword fairly vibrating in his hand.

He turned the corner, and skidded to a halt on the lower platform. All around them, it was impossible to see the bottom of the yawning chasm below, and the slightest noise reverberated and amplified, bouncing back from all directions.

Luneth stepped forward, and his heart sank into his gut as he stared at the broken shards of crystal huddled pathetically in the centre of the crystal platform. Some pieces had melted, it seemed, and fused to the ground from the heat of a spell.

"Who—"

Terra gasped and clutched at her head, and Luneth reached out to catch her.

"It's him, isn't it?" he said.

She shuddered, her voice a faint whisper. "I can feel it."

"Who?" Bartz said sharply.

The shrieking laughter seemed to come from everywhere. Luneth saw a flash of red, and then the huge, upside down grin was hanging from above, inches from his face.

Luneth swallowed a shout and sprang back, Onion Sword coming around in a sweeping slash.

"Kefka," he said through gritted teeth.

The clown twisted in midair to avoid his attack and landed lightly on the platform, his blood-red back facing the warriors of Cosmos.

"Hmm..." The sound buzzed all around them. "It seems we have a rat problem!" He brought a hand up to one side of his face, miming speaking into some kind of handheld device. "Hello, hello! Exterminator! _Whaat?_ No vacancies? I guess I'll just have to..." Kefka swung around, then, twisting his upper body as he raised a knee high in a caricature of a dash, and there was a horrible leer on his face. "...do it _myself_ , then!"

Luneth dived to one side to avoid the spray of fiery arrows, scrabbling and clinging hold to the edge of the platform as his legs tipped over and swung over the void.

He heard the bangs of the Lionheart over his head as he hauled himself back up. He dashed in, blade stabbing forward in a flurry of strikes, and Kefka hopped up and back, cackling the whole way, before winding up his arm, an inferno blazing and growing in his hand.  
Just as the clown was about to launch it, a hissing, spitting fireball rammed into his face and exploded. He staggered back, but it was immediately followed with sharp crystals of ice that accumulated like a morningstar, freezing patches of his skin dead white. A rumble, and a crackling bolt of lightning pierced down and earthed itself through Kefka's feet.

Luneth shouldn't have been impressed by now. He always knew he couldn't quickcast nearly as well as Terra just managed on foreign spells.

Kefka screamed and clawed at the air over his face. White glitters of Trine appeared under him and shot outwards in every direction.

Luneth leapt and tumbled out of the path of the spells. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Bartz score a deep, bloody gash over Kefka's leg before pulling away and shielding his face as a spell erupted under his feet. He bounced once, back thudding against metal, and vanished over the edge of the platform.

He knew why Bartz had done it. To hinder Kefka's movements. But he hated it: this kind of suicidal, blind courage.

He was yelling something now. He didn't know what.

Squall twisted up above Kefka, bringing gunblade and heel down to drive the clown into the ground. A ring of explosions blasted out from the circle his blade had traced.

And then Kefka was under Luneth, writhing and blinded by smoke, and Luneth dived. Drops of blood stung against his skin. Good, that had hit. He kicked off and up, a sense of weightlessness merging unpleasantly with the distortion he felt from shifting jobs.

"Flare," he whispered, and his vision went white.

The metal platform had buckled and cracked, and it shifted ominously under his feet.

Kefka was flat on his back, and he thought the broken pieces of the wind crystal had pierced through the clown's back. Mangled limbs twitched once.

Luneth grabbed at Kefka's jacket. "Why did you do this? Why break the crystal?"

Kefka barked a laugh, and it changed into a hacking cough from seared lungs. "We knew you would come here."

"We? Who is 'we'?"

Kefka shuddered so hard it looked like a convulsion.

Luneth shook him hard. "Tell me!"

He thought he would shake the clown again, but Squall's hand dropped heavily on his shoulder and tried to pull him back.

"Hey, he's dead."

Luneth sat back, staring at the blackened walls of the cave. He had failed. Bartz's sacrifice was...

"Bartz," he said, and it was almost a whimper.

"What's up?" Bartz responded.

He thought it was a ghost for a wild moment, but then he saw the glow of Terra's trance, rising slowly from the chasm.

Bartz collapsed to the floor as soon as his feet touched solid ground again, and he tried to hug the platform. "I thought I was a goner!" he said, wild relief in his voice.

"You almost were! You _idiot!_ Don't ever do that again!"

Bartz turned his head, face still plastered against the floor of the platform. His eyes were solemn and soft.

"I'm sorry, Luneth," he said.

* * *

Luneth stretched out next to the fire, enjoying the wandering breeze over his face.

None of them had wanted to stay in the cavern for more time than was necessary, but without the crystal, and without the warp it maintained, Luneth had wondered if he could perhaps convince Exdeath to let down a rope for them.

"Luneth," Terra had interrupted, "I have your Teleport spell."

He sighed, looking up at the night sky, and let himself feel stupid for a moment again.

The urgency had set in once they had retrieved Exdeath and left the cave. If the crystals of light were being broken, that would explain why darkness was overpowering the light world again. Luneth had to know if the other crystals were safe.

As for the wind crystal... Terra had said she could hear it whispering to her, that it would regrow through the power of the four chosen warriors, in time. It couldn't tell them anything else. It was too weak, it had said.

Luneth didn't like leaving it, even so, but the other crystals...

He sat up with a gasp. The earth was shaking under them.

"What's going on?" Bartz pitched against him when a particularly strong quake tossed him forward.

What looked like giant red orbs whistled through the air, and a dozen Grenades spun and landed, weaving about as they surrounded the warriors.

"Something is happening in the Molten Cave! We have to go in now!"

A slash of his sword tossed one of the monsters back, and it shuddered, growing twice as large as before.

Cursing under his breath, Luneth spun around. If one of them blew, then the others would too. He tried not to imagine the crater that would be left on the ground.

"Terra!" he called.

And suddenly, he could see his breath in the air before him. The Grenades hung like crystalline decorations ringing them, each frozen solid in glittering ice.

Starting from one end, the Blizzaga spells shattered, sprinkling snow on the ground while the monsters screeched and wisped away into nothing.

"Thank you, Terra," he said, his heart still hammering in his chest.

Squall nodded beside them.

"Let's go in," Squall said.

Luneth tore past the monsters in the cave. He dimly registered slashing into the enemies that sprang out at him as he sprinted, but all he could think about was the fire crystal.

He thought he could hear Bartz yelling at him to slow down and let them look at the burns on his arms, but he ran on, and when he entered the crystal chamber and the fire crystal glittered, whole and pulsing with power, down at him, he let out his breath in a hard whoosh and sagged.

Pain seared through his shoulder, and Luneth gasped, looking down at the purple-black barb piercing through his body.

"Luneth!"

Terra slid to the ground beside him, her hand glowing. The barb ground itself slowly out of his shoulder, the skin healing in its wake and red with irritation.

"Oh good. An audience. I shall enjoy this."

Luneth glared up at Ultimecia, eyes stinging with pain, as she turned gracefully in the air and extended an arm towards the fire crystal.

"No! Don't touch the crystal!"

He heard a snarl behind him, and there was a blur of black.

Squall flew at Ultimecia, the Lionheart held up high. A beam of light blazed from its tip, and he swung it downwards. The air glowed in its wake, as if the beam was boiling it away.

Ultimecia pulled away, clasping her arm like it had been burned. She hissed.

"You do not have a place here!"

She waved her hand, and more barbs shot toward Squall.

Twisting and dodging, Squall flicked the projectiles away with the gunblade. He stood between Ultimecia and the crystal now, and Luneth saw the cold twist of his lips, and he shivered.

"Time's up," Squall said.

He leapt up, pushing Ultimecia back into the shadowed arch of the high ceilings, and Luneth couldn't see them anymore but for the sprays of sparks scattering in the wake of the crashing blows.

A flash, and Exdeath appeared, teleported directly under Ultimecia. She screeched, tumbling through the air at his slash.

"What do you think you're doing? Who brought you here?"

And she screamed again, a streak of blood splattering to the ground, and reeled away from Bartz, shooting black, shrouded spells back.  
Bartz swung the Brave Blade quickly, and ricocheting spells exploded against the walls of the chamber, knocking chunks of rock loose to drop down into the spitting lava below the crystal platform. The force of the spells knocked Bartz back, and he dropped down onto the platform below, landing and rolling.

"How dare you!" Ultimecia raged. Squall was diving down toward her, Lionheart extended and glowing white. She raised her arms over her head, black roiling power gathering between her hands. " _Time!_ "

Luneth watched in horror as Squall's descent seized and stopped, and Exdeath's raised weapon stilled as well, freezing like a macabre tableau.

Blood sprayed wide. Luneth cried out, watching Squall's body hang in space, not even jerking at Ultimecia's blow.

Laughter filled the air, heavy as lead pressing down on his head. Ultimecia raised her hand, black spears forming and hanging beside her. She plucked one out of the air and held it thoughtfully in front of Squall's throat.

"Hmm. Reality is harsh, is it not?"

She reared back to strike.

Crackling white light crawled over her body like ropes, pinning her arm in place and pulling her backward. As Ultimecia screamed and struggled, Luneth saw Squall begin to move by the tiniest increments.

He looked up at Terra, standing beside him, her arms thrown up at Ultimecia and shaking with tension. She was biting her lip so hard that the flesh had gone white, and a droplet of blood welled up slowly.

"I can't..." Terra shook her head. "I don't have enough power..."

Luneth grasped her hands with both of his own, opening deep inside and pouring every bit of his power into her.

The white light glowed brighter and constricted harder, and Squall sped up, raising the blazing Lionheart over his head with eyes wide and focussed.

He pulled at his magical reserves viciously. He was running dry, he knew.

A warm hand landed on his and squeezed, and Luneth felt Bartz's power streaming through his hands and Terra's like wind.

He looked up into Bartz's cheery smile.

Above them, Ultimecia screamed again, long and grating, as sixteen blasts of light flashed in quick succession, filling the cavern.

It was silent afterward.

A thud and a skid, and Squall was leaning heavily against Luneth's side, his right arm dripping blood from fingertips like long red nails.

Luneth pushed back, bracing himself to keep them both standing. His magic casts were gone, he knew. Digging through his inventory, he poured a hi-potion over Squall's arm. Pale mist wisped, taking the worst of the injuries away as they dissolved.

"Thanks."

He smiled. Squall nodded at him, testing his right arm.

 _Chosen Warrior_

Luneth jumped. The voice of the crystal entered his head without passing through his ears. The others straightened as well, faint puzzlement on their faces.

 _I thank you and your friends, Chosen Warrior._

"Oh. Yes, no need. I'm glad we made it in time."

 _The water crystal remains safe and untouched, but the earth crystal has sent images to me of a cloud of darkness gathering once more in Xande's lair._

Luneth's eyes widened. "It's back?"

 _It is likely that the cloud of darkness was sent to the lair because as the place of its rebirth, the barrier between light and darkness is at its thinnest._

"It must have returned with me, after the war."

 _Be wary, Chosen Warrior. The cloud of darkness must anticipate your arrival._

Luneth clenched his fists. He would never run away again. He promised Terra.

No, he promised _himself_.

"It's okay," he said, and he was proud that his voice did not waver. "I have some unfinished business with it, too."

His friends were watching him.

"Let's go," he said. "We have to leave the floating continent."

* * *

Luneth stood at the prow of the Airship Invincible, looking down at the world spread before his feet. The sun was rising, casting long, sharp shadows over every mountain valley.

He couldn't help the sense of vastness that seeped into his bones, making him feel tiny in comparison.

It wasn't fair. He thought it would be over after the first time he was "chosen". He thought he would live in peace after that. Maybe take up some fishing. No more enemies he thought he could not beat even if he ripped up everything he was inside. Ingus had tried to protect him. Tried to give him part of his childhood back.

But then the war happened, and it was so long that when it was over, and he was back, he didn't know if he remembered how to do anything else but fight.

He rubbed his eyes hard. He was tired.

He wondered what his mother was like. Would she have known everything, like Princess Sara sometimes did? Would she have been able to tell Luneth what he needed to do?

He felt like he had jumped into decisions headfirst so many times that he didn't know how to get back. What would Ingus have done? At what point should he have made a better decision?

"Luneth?"

He jumped. "Terra! What's wrong?"

Terra shook her head, her hair shining almost white in the morning light. "Did you sleep at all?"

"Oh, I..." Luneth scratched his head, laughing awkwardly. "I was too wired. You know how it is."

"Maybe."

He watched her for a moment, looking down and around at his world.

"What do you think?" he said softly, gesturing down at the scene.

"It's... beautiful." Terra gave him a hesitant smile. "It's almost frightening, seeing all of it like this."

Luneth shook his head earnestly. "There's no need to be afraid. I will always be here, and I will protect you."

"That's what you said last time, too."

Luneth winced, looking away. "I'm sorry. I couldn't protect—"

"No! That's not what I meant!"

Her arms were tight around his shoulders, and hot tears soaked through his hair.

"You're always promising to protect someone, even when you're so scared you're shaking. It's not fair! I want to be stronger. I want to be able to protect you, too!"

Luneth stood still. "You _are_ strong, Terra," he said in a while. "We couldn't have beat Ultimecia without your Holy magic. You saved us all."

"Stop it!"

He stared up at her, taken aback. "Wh—what?"

"Stop feeling responsible for me! For my feelings! I want to be strong so that I can stand next to you, to all my friends, and you will not look back at me to see if I'm okay, because you can _trust_ me."

The ship had sunk into the dawn out of the shadow of the floating continent now, and light was all around them.

Luneth smiled so brightly, he thought he might blind the sun.

"Yeah," he said, "let's get strong together."

* * *

Flashes of Holy whipped over his head as Luneth flanked the Bone Dragon with Bartz, both stabbing for the weak hollows between the segments of its spine, and he did not look around to check on Terra. He could picture her narrowed eyes and raised hands as she focussed and swung out spell after spell.

He ducked and dashed under a swiping claw, hurriedly rubbing the sweat from his eyes. Leaping up, he dived, the Onion Sword thudding into the monster's exposed neck and sinking down to the hilt.

It screeched, thrashing underneath him, and he clung to the smooth bone, trying to dig his fingers in between the cracks.

Finally, it tilted sideways and clattered to the ground, nearly burying him with falling bones. Coughing at the dust that the beast raised, Luneth accepted Squall's hand and pulled himself up out of the pile.

Even with the earth crystal's repeated warnings that the Cloud of Darkness was waiting for him, he wondered if they would even make it to the Crystal Tower past the monsters, which were stronger than he ever remembered them.

He snuck a look at Squall, and found him looking straight back at him.

Squall nodded decisively. "We're gonna make it. You've defeated it before."

Luneth laughed helplessly. "But my friends were there with me the whole time. They're so strong."

"And what are _we_ , chopped liver?" Bartz said indignantly.

Luneth accepted the punch to his shoulder, laughing and raising his hands placatingly. "Sorry, sorry. You're right. We're going to do this. Because we have to."

Terra's smile was warm, and he held that feeling in his chest as he spun around and swung hard, shearing off the head of a Bluck before it had the chance to even think of summoning anything.

And then they were in the sunlight again, looking up at the Crystal Tower as it faded and disappeared into the white clouds torn and swirling around its spires.

Luneth stared at the door, gaping black and huge against the shine of the tower.

"Is this it?" Bartz said, mouth wide as he leaned his head back to look up the length of it.

Luneth nodded.

"Yeah. Let's do this."

* * *

TBC – And then there was FF10.


	3. Unforgiven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 3. **Unforgiven**
> 
> Disclaimers still apply.
> 
> I've decided to take a bit of a weird approach to Tidus's character, and I hope you like it, anyway. More time has passed for him than any of the other Cosmos warriors since the end of Dissidia due to the events of X-2. Er, and I have not played FFX-2 yet and only collected my information from Wikis. Just saying.

The ball rebounded off the other player and hurtled back toward him, and he slammed it upward, water spraying as it burst through the surface above. He kicked his legs hard, and he soared up, the roar of the crowd becoming deafening as he streaked out of the water into the blinding sunlight. Using his arms as a pivot, he curled around, wind whistling past his ears and cradling the arch of his back, and he brought his leg down as the ball reached the apex of its climb.

It drove through the water, bubbles foaming in its wake as it streaked towards the goal like a comet.

The noise was like a solid pressure now, sending his head buzzing.

" _Goooooooal!_ "

He dove back into the sphere pool, his teammates' hands reaching out and slapping him on the shoulders, on the ass, wherever they could reach, and the announcer's voice came clearly to them through the water.

"And it's another amazing goal by the Zanarkands' ace, Tidus the Cyclone! Ladies and gentlemen, the Zanarkand Abes have dominated this match, no doubt thanks to Tidus's devastating Jecht Shot. The son of Jecht certainly seems to have something to prove in this match, especially with his father watching on—"

Tidus gasped, and he choked, water streaming into his lungs.

He swam up, arms flying everywhere, no sign of the confident, controlled ace left as he struggled to break the water surface.

And then there was fresh air around him, and he hacked until he thought his throat was bleeding, water streaming down his chin and neck.

Looking around wildly, he saw it, the enormous mass of something like water, hovering over the bleachers closest to the sea. It hung like a tidal wave stopped in time, and the sounds around him muffled out as if his ears were stuffed with cotton, and it was just him, staring at it.

It was looking back at him.

Then it surged forward, and the rest of the world slammed back with the crunch of breaking bleachers, toppling buildings, and the screams of the people caught in the way.

No.

No, it was gone. Jecht was the last. He had to be!

"Tidus!"

Yuna's voice.

He spun around, treading water, peering at the ground far below.

There. A blur of white and indigo whirled into focus, and she was there, arms stretched out towards him, fear etched across her face.

"Tidus!" she screamed again.

He struggled, pushing himself out of the water and diving for her, reaching for her hands as white, cold water pounded over his body and his vision swam.

Sin loomed over them, casting a heavy black shadow, and he stretched out even further, his fingertips almost brushing hers.

" _Tidus!_ "

* * *

Tidus jerked, arms coming up and throwing out in a wild punch reflexively.

He connected with nothing but air, and it wasn't until he sat, hunched over and gasping for breath, that he noticed the hands gripping his forearm tightly.

He looked around at the simple cabin, swaying with the ship as it swelled with the waves, at the colourful fabric beneath him on the bed and tangled around his legs, and he looked up into Yuna's worried eyes.

"Are you okay, Tidus?"

Tidus took in a shaky breath and wiped away the sweat stinging in his eyes. "Yeah," he said finally. "Sorry, bad dream."

"You've been having a lot of them, lately, haven't you?"

He shrugged, shook his head, and he smiled at her. "Hey, you were going to talk to the New Yevon, right? What did Baralai say when you told him you wanted to visit the villages outside of Luca, as well?"

Yuna covered her mouth to muffle her giggles. "He was horrified!"

Tidus pulled the sheet away from its strangle-hold around his legs and scooted over to let her sit on the bed beside him.

"He gave me that _look_ —"

"You mean this look?" Tidus furrowed his eyebrows and scowled so hard his eyes crossed.

"That's the one. He insisted on sending an armed escort with me, and when I said I was going with you as my bodyguard, he said—" Yuna paused here to clear her throat and deepen her voice, "'High Summoner Yuna, we agreed to take you and your sphere hunter friends to Luca on our ship because of the calming influence of your presence during our summit with the Youth League, yet you persist in these reckless pursuits. When will you learn the decorum required for your position?' and then he sighed and waved me away, saying that I could go as long as you did your job right." Yuna cocked her head and smiled. "He really believes in your strength, just like Brother."

Tidus scoffed. "In my utter terror of disobeying him and getting that look again, more likely."

She laughed, soft and sweet, "No matter the reason, they trust you. As do I. Thank you for coming with me."

He braced his hands behind his head and leaned back. "Don't thank me, yet. Wait until the villagers give you dirty looks for having someone as 'uncouth' as me around." He huffed. "You really care about them, don't you?"

Yuna smiled warmly. "Yes. They are in the middle of repairs in the wake of the last battle. After... after everything that happened, I should be there with them."

"Even though most of them think you should summon Valefor and give those 'interfering, machina-loving youngsters' a sound thrashing?"

"They're... set in their ways. They're not bad people, Tidus."

"Well," Tidus leaned his forehead against Yuna's, "I'm glad you're the one dealing with them, then. I wouldn't be able to tell."

She tilted her head a bit, and warm breath washed over his lips when she laughed. "And maybe that's what I like about you."

Her eyes slid shut, and she leaned into him when he kissed her. She sighed softly, opening her mouth to him as he pushed her gently back onto the bed.

Tidus hissed, pulling back sharply at the stabs of pain in his arm. He clamped a hand over it quickly, before Yuna saw the pyrefly looping slowly over his skin.

"What's wrong?"

"Sorry," Tidus said. "I, ah, slept on my arm funny, and it's gone completely to sleep on me."

Yuna didn't look entirely convinced, but before she could protest, a flurry of movement echoed over their heads, footsteps resounding through the wood of the ship.

"We must have reached Luca," Yuna said, standing reluctantly. "I'm sorry; I have to go greet the Youth League's emissaries with Brother."

Tidus waved off her apology. "They're probably going to start a fistfight if you're not there. You'd better get up there quickly."

Yuna nodded. She hesitated for a moment, and then she pressed a quick kiss to his temple and darted out of the cabin.

Tidus sighed, the smile dropping off of his face and his head falling back against the wall with a thunk. He resented this. This... half life. He knew what he was. He was practically an unsent, formed through the thoughts of the Fayth when they gathered up his pyreflies again, and the Fayth could see everything he did. Didn't _that_ make his daily ablutions awkward. The Fayth didn't like it when he got too close to Yuna. It was so obvious. And when they got upset, he... dissolved. He didn't know how else to describe it. Maybe the Fayth lost focus, or maybe they were doing it on purpose to punish him; either way, the pains would hit him, and the pyreflies would drift away.

He felt a savage feeling of victory flicker through him. He had gotten much better at manipulating the pyreflies, though, and he could pull them back in now. He found it was easiest when he was angry, when the pyreflies seemed to become sluggish and amenable to his will.

He watched a speck of light, wavering and wisping, come through wall and hover over him. Slowly, it sank down, casting its weak glow onto his chest in the filtered daylight in the cabin.

And wasn't it easy to be angry. It filled him until it seemed like all he had inside him was rage, running through his veins, pumping through his heart. They had him on the ends of their strings. He was their _puppet_. None of his decisions were his own, not when the Fayth held the shears, pressing down on the strings that kept him tied to this world. They could disperse him at a whim if he wasn't behaving the model guard, and for that, he _hated_ them.

The pyrefly vanished under his skin, and he felt new strength flowing through him.

Scrubbing at his face, Tidus stood. Lucans thought of him as something of a hero, if not because of the startling victory the Besaid Aurochs had pulled off with him as their star forward, then definitely after the truth of Yeven and Sin came out. They expected him to smile and shake hands.

Tidus ruffled his hands through his hair, and he stepped out into the sun.

* * *

The villages would be swallowed by Luca proper sooner or later, but for now, Tidus glanced around absently, scanning the splashes of colour decorating the small huts, the deep green of the forests around them, and the warmth wafting out of the stone paving beneath his feet. There was a small fountain in the centre of the village, and Yuna stood in front of it, surrounded by fawning supplicants on all sides.

Tidus crossed his arms, trying to look as imposing as possible as he watched out for anything that may threaten Yuna.

The Caladbolg shimmered blue like deep sea at his hip—he loved the colour, and he thought sometimes that maybe it was blue like that just for him—and he tried not to look bored. The village was filled with the elderly and small children. The rest of the populace were in Luca, either working or having abandoned the little village for life in the city. Yuna could probably beat off any threats from these people with her eyes closed.

The crowd was growing, and Tidus stood up straighter, a hand falling to his sword.

There were soldiers at the edges of the crowd, wearing no colours that he recognized. They all had the same blank look on their faces, and they moved oddly, feet dragging as if being pulled forward more than being lifted up.

Clamping down on the rising sense of dread, Tidus shoved through the crowd, ignoring the indignant shouts, and he stopped in front of Yuna, an arm held up to bar her against the fountain behind them. He stared around at the soldiers, and they sped up, drawing their swords as they bore down on him and Yuna. The village people scattered, shrieks ringing through the air, and Tidus ran forward to meet the crush of blades.

He leaned back to avoid a slash to the chest, bringing a leg up in front to plant it solidly into a soldier's breastplate. Kicking up with the other leg, he swung around, Caladbolg knocking free several upraised swords while his boot slammed into the sides of their heads.

Their armour clanked as they collapsed to the ground in a cloud of dust, but the soldiers rolled up again immediately, their eyes vacant as they struck at Tidus viciously.

Tidus slashed across the back of one soldier's wrist, and blood ran down the hilt of the soldier's sword, rolling off the guard into the dust, but the soldier didn't flinch.

Another was rushing at him, and Tidus dropped to the ground, bringing his leg around in a scything sweep. The soldier was lifted off his feet and flew sideways to clatter to the ground, accompanied by the crunch of breaking bone as his leg impacted on a bad angle.

And Tidus watched in horror as the soldier dragged himself to his feet, a hint of white bone visible in tears in the soft fabric covering his legs.

Puppets, he thought. They were being controlled and driven past the limits of their bodies.

He glanced around hurriedly. Their ultimate target was probably Yuna.

Another soldier went down briefly to a heavy gash on his leg that should have severed his hamstring, but he pulled himself up again, legs still moving despite the foot turned out and dragging like dead weight on the ground.

He charged Tidus now, sword hacking down towards Tidus's neck, and Tidus backed away hurriedly and almost tripped over a soldier leaning over to snatch up his fallen sword. Tidus fought wildly to regain his balance, he shouted, and he thrust forward with the Caladbolg.

His sword crunched through the soldier's ribcage. Scalding blood surged out, splattering over Tidus's hand in hard spurts, and the soldier went limp.

The soldier had slid off the Caladbolg and sagged to the ground before the screaming began. He thought it was the villagers at first, but it was too close, echoing through his head. It overpowered him, and he sank to the ground helplessly as the roar of noise continued, making him see blinding white. He barely felt it when the soldier behind him, having recovered his sword, ran it through his side.

Forcing his eyes to stay open, he thought he saw Yuna's mouth moving, shouting at him, but he couldn't hear what she was saying. She was running toward him now, a gun in one hand and the other glowing with healing magic.

Pyreflies burst from his body, spinning and shooting away into the sky, and Yuna skidded to a halt. She reached out a hand, but the stream of pyreflies sped up, whipping around as if in a phantom wind now, and she hurriedly backed away. The outward flow stuttered and stopped.

The Fayth! Tidus thought he would howl with rage. It was the Fayth! Their scream rang still in his head, dying raggedly when Yuna backed away even further, spurred by the grimace on his face.

His blood was hot and sticky under his body, and Tidus tried to move his sword, to push himself to his feet. Yuna!

He had to save Yuna!

 _Move!_

Black flames erupted in a flowing pillar somewhere to his left, roaring by and curving around him, blasting through the strange soldiers, still standing eerily silent around him. Tiny flames licked at the blackened ground after the pillar had blown out, and the soldiers hadn't even left ashes behind.

Gleaming white approached him, and a hand reached out towards him. His vision swam violently then, and went black.

* * *

The first thing he noticed was the pain.

Tidus moaned, clutching at his side, but the skin was tender to the touch, and he pulled his hand away quickly. Magic healing was fast, but it had its drawbacks.

Hands grabbed his shoulders when he tried to sit up, and they pushed him down onto his back firmly.

"You shouldn't be moving yet."

Tidus cracked an eye open. It wasn't Yuna's voice. It wasn't even a voice he thought he'd ever hear on Spira.

Snow white hair had fallen over violet eyes that were deeply shadowed against pale skin.

"You look like you haven't slept in days, Cecil," Tidus croaked.

"You're one to talk," Cecil said, sitting back and putting his hands on his knees. "You look terrible."

"I feel terrible." He tried to sit up again, and this time, Cecil helped him up despite an exasperated sigh. Tidus accepted the mug of water Cecil offered. "Where's Yuna?" he asked sharply.

"She's fine. She decided to remain in the other room."

"Oh." That meant the Fayth were probably still upset at him.

"You know that glowing orbs of light leap from your body when she approaches?"

"Yeah. It's because the guys that made me are trying to break me down again. They want to keep me away from her."

"Why?" Yuna said from the doorway.

Tidus winced. Her face was drawn with worry and fear.

"Why did the Fayth scream so loudly earlier? Why won't they let me get close? I can't even heal you!" Her voice had gotten steadily higher until the last word was a ragged shriek.

Tidus looked down at his hands. Cecil must have cleaned them. He felt his stomach roil, imagining Cecil wiping away the residue.

"I killed someone, Yuna," he said. The words bit at him like knives. "The Fayth hate that. They hate me."

"You had to! They were going to kill you!"

"I don't think that matters."

Yuna was quiet for a moment, and when she spoke again, her voice was hard. "Guardians have killed to protect summoners, before. It's not that rare. It has to be something else. There has to be a reason." She turned, fists clenched at her side. "I'm going to talk to them. There has to be something else."

Tidus listened to her boots scuff the floor as she headed out of the room.

He swung his legs off the bed, waving aside Cecil's protests. He closed his eyes, concentrated on the anger simmering below the surface inside him, and he fed it, piece by piece.

They try to control him. They tried to kill him. They hurt _Yuna_.

He felt them, tiny points of energy, and their glow played over his eyelids. Cecil gasped beside him, and he opened his eyes. The room was filled with pyreflies, swirling around like a funnel cloud in front of him. He had never seen so many before. Then again, he had never lost so many before, either.

Tidus stepped into the storm of pyreflies, and they settled on him like a suit of armour, prickling lightly, before they sank under his skin.

"What was that?"

Tidus waved his hands and smiled crookedly. "They're like the energy of Spira. I was just healing myself."

"Healing?"

"Yep! I'm strong as a horse now."

His pumped his arm, and his exuberance seemed to calm Cecil. It wasn't that surprising. It was all that he showed to his friends during the war, after all. But a lot had happened since then, since he found himself floating offshore of Besaid after what seemed like eons of nothing while his pyreflies drifted sluggishly throughout Spira. He told Yuna that he didn't remember what it was like, to be scattered like that, and it was true, really. He didn't remember anything beyond a feeling of loneliness.

Cecil sucked in a sharp breath next to him, and he rushed to the small window of the hut, peering out.

"What?" Tidus asked. Cecil was already tearing outside, looking as if he'd seen a ghost.

Tidus followed, skidded a bit when he doubled back to retrieve his sword, and he dashed out, chasing the path he thought he remembered the edge of Cecil's white cape taking. He had asked Cecil once whether the cape got in the way when he was fighting, and Cecil had laughed and said he hadn't thought about it, and that Rosa made his clothes. He said—

The black armour, embellished with blue and gold, looked out of place in the small village square filled with bright colours.

Cecil had his arms thrown out, and he was leaning earnestly towards Golbez. "But brother—!"

"Do not be stupid, Cecil. You are stronger than I. I am ashamed of your repeated obsession with collecting useless people—" Here Tidus was _sure_ that Golbez had given him a nasty look. "—around you—"

"I am _strongest_ when I am together with my friends," Cecil said sharply.

Golbez didn't respond, but Tidus saw him sag a bit, as if in acceptance.

"And I would like to include you among their number," his brother said.

Golbez was silent for a long while. "You have become a fine leader, Cecil," he said finally. "I will follow you." His voice hardened in warning, then. "You are no longer a child, and I will not treat you as such."

"I am grateful for your belief in me, brother, and I will not let you down."

The atmosphere was still heavy, though, and Tidus laced his hands behind his head and sauntered slowly towards Golbez. "So, yeah, welcome to the team, Golbez!" he said cheerfully. "I'm sure we'll make a good story together. Or hey, should I call you Theodor from now on?" Violet eyes turned to him under the heavy mask, and they were positively _glacial_. Tidus stepped away and resisted the urge to move closer to Cecil.

Okay, 'Golbez' it was, then.

Tidus staggered, pins prickling over his body, and one or two pyreflies managed to wisp away.

There was a scuffling noise behind him and a clatter. He turned, and Yuna looked back at him, eyes dark with pain. "Sorry," she said. She had backed away hurriedly, it looked like, and knocked over a bucket.

Tidus shook his head. "I'm fine."

"Interesting." Golbez crossed his arms, looking first at him, and then Yuna. "You disintegrate when your woman approaches?"

Tidus scratched the back of his head, laughing awkwardly. "Yeah... It's a bit of a funny story."

"The Fayth won't tell me why they're doing this to you," Yuna said quietly. "They've never refused to speak to me outright like this, before."

"I fear the actions of these Fayth speak of a personal vendetta," Cecil said.

Oh good, so he wasn't just paranoid.

"What are we going to do?"

Tidus turned to Yuna. "I'll go find the Fayth. I'll speak to them personally."

Yuna nodded, and her face crumpled. "I can't go with you, can I?"

Tidus steeled himself, pulling himself tight, and he stepped toward Yuna. The pain started again, and he saw his arms glimmering a bit as pyreflies struggled to escape, but he held on. He held up a hand to Yuna, forcing his legs to walk forward, and it felt as if he was heading into a strong wind.

"What are you doing?" Yuna cried.

"I promise I will be back." Tidus said, trying to reach her still. "I promise I will come back to you."

"Stop!"

"Nothing the Fayth do can keep me from you."

There were tear-tracks on her face now, and she nodded hard, her eyes squeezed shut.

"Hey," Tidus said, "Laugh with me. We'll stand at the edge of a cliff and let it out, just like before."

He was losing control of the pyreflies, but he was so close. Her hand reached up, almost touching his. His skin felt like it was boiling. He was almost there.

Yuna snatched her hand back. Then, something beautiful and strong in her eyes, she smiled, she whirled around, and she ran away.

Tidus sagged, the ripping feeling gone. He glanced at Cecil, who had come up behind him, and was looking at him with sad eyes. "Ah, sorry," he said. And because he hated those eyes, that look ("poor boy, losing both his father and mother in quick succession..."), he put his hands on his hips and jutted his chest out. "Well, what are we waiting for?" he said loudly, grinning when Cecil jumped. "The floating ruins of the Fayth are on top of Mt. Gagazet. Let's check them out!"

* * *

Tidus dragged a pillow over his head to muffle his groan, and he burrowed further under the covers of his bunk as clatters and thuds filled their airship cabin. If he had known it would be like this, he would have suggested that they walk. Then maybe those two would be too tired to insist on rising at Shiva-awful times like the crack of dawn. Then again, given what he knew of soldiers' discipline... (He shuddered at the memory of Cloud, who had taken one look at him during a fight, decided that his "footwork was deplorable", and had taken Tidus under his wing and roused him while it was still dark every morning to work on sword drills with him.)

When the whispered argument about whether to wake him started—he always knew Golbez was a sadistic jerk—he gave up and dragged himself out of bed. He was a morning person, he really was, but this was ridiculous.

"We approach Mt. Gagazet this morning, do we not?" Golbez said over breakfast.

Tidus had stared so much the first time he'd removed his helmet, he'd forgotten to eat.

"Yeah, we should dock at its base before noon."

"Why does this ship not simply fly up to the fortress atop this mountain?"

"It's still considered something of a sacred place. The people who live on the mountain, the Ronsos..." Tidus fumbled for words for a while before giving up. "Augh, you'll see when you meet them."

True to his prediction, the travellers met the ends of Ronso spears at the gates of the mountain path before a heavily scarred Ronso he didn't recognize stepped forward to give them a menacing stare.

"State business," he said. Tidus tried not to picture the man barking like a dog.

"We need to speak to the Fayth—"

"Humans have no business seeking Fayth."

He could see Golbez shifting to free his sword from the folds of his cape out of the corner of his eye. Cecil lifted a hand out in front of Golbez's chest, and he paused. Tidus weighed his odds of escaping before being flattened between Golbez and the looming Ronso.

"Such blatant xenophobia is not fitting of proud Ronso race, Kelik," a new voice said, hard and sharp.

Tidus nearly sagged with relief.

Kimahri stood nearly a head shorter than the scarred Ronso, but the other guards didn't hesitate before lowering their spears. After a moment, Kelik stepped back, turning to face Kimahri and lowering his eyes.

"Yes, Elder."

"This man brought Eternal Calm to Spira as guardian to High Summoner Yuna. He has more right to speak to Fayth than any other."

Kelik and the other guards bowed slightly and moved aside to flank the gates.

Kimahri kept his hard stare on Kelik as he waved a hand at Tidus. "Come, Tidus. I will take you up past second gate."

Loping along behind Kimahri's long stride, he thought he might have heard Cecil murmuring his thanks the guards, and Golbez snorted.

Kimahri turned to Tidus when he judged them out of earshot of the guards, and he said, "Forgive them. We were attacked two days ago by strange human soldiers. They are wary."

"We were attacked by them, too, outside Luca!" Tidus said, surprised. "Maybe they were the same group of soldiers."

Kimahri shook his head. "Attacks are happening all over Spira. They attack and raid. Foraging parties."

"Foraging for who, then? Who's in command of them?"

"Ronso do not know." Kimahri turned his head and eyed Cecil and Golbez. "Your friends do not smell of completely human. Nor do soldiers."

Tidus waved his hand at the delicate question. "This is Cecil Harvey and his brother Golbez, and it's true they're from somewhere else. The soldiers are probably from another world outside of Spira, too, and it's possible that they came from the same place as those two, but they're not together. I trust them."

Kimahri gave him a doubtful look, but then he nodded. "Very well. You have good instincts."

They had passed through the Ronso settlement and under a second set of gates now. The guards eyed them distrustfully, but made no move to bar their way.

Kimahri pointed up the mountain track, splashed white with snow. "Follow path to summit. Ruins of the Fayth lie above clouds." He dropped his hand heavily onto Tidus's shoulder. "You seek answers to strangers entering Spira?"

Tidus shrugged. "I'll find out what I can."

Kimahri nodded, and stepped back. "Go well."

The Ronso settlement dropped out of sight quickly, and the path steepened. Tidus was wheezing a bit at the abrupt altitude shift when Cecil dropped into a guard stance, hand on sword.

"Something's here."

The Caladbolg felt heavy and comforting in his hand as Tidus peered about the snow-covered brush, and when two Takouba skittered out onto the path and tried to flank them, he felt an odd sense of relief. Fiends. Fiends he could deal with.

He leapt up, flipping in the air, and brought his sword down like a guillotine, its shearing noise accompanied by the crunch of chitin. Fiends didn't cover his hands with blood.

The Takouba collapsed in a heap of legs, and behind him, Tidus saw Golbez pull an arm back and clench his fist. The other fiend burst into flames and evaporated with a shriek.

"Pitiful," Golbez said, swinging his cape back dramatically and stalking up the path, ignoring the last few tongues of flame hissing in the snow.

Cecil caught his eye and smiled, rolling his own slightly, and Tidus muffled a snicker.

* * *

They were attacked a few more times by low-level fiends by the time the ruins stretched high over their heads, and Tidus had begun to relax. The hymn of the Fayth echoed soothingly. The Fayth were inside, then, singing gently.

Tidus pushed open the heavy doors, and they ground along the floor unsteadily.

Just inside, he stopped. A boy was watching him with fearful eyes, and he dashed away quickly when Tidus raised a hand to greet him.

"Wait!"

Cecil frowned after the boy. "That child?"

"He's one the Fayth. Bahamut, actually." Tidus crossed his arms and scowled. "He's never looked scared of me, before."

"You!" A man dressed as a crusader ran into the hall and stopped well away from him, pointing a sword at his neck. "How dare you enter this place!"

Bewildered, Tidus backed away. "What did I do? Why are you all afraid of me?"

"As well they should be," said a voice, contempt dripping like oil. An old man clumped into the hall, leaning heavily on a tall staff. The old man, a Fayth Tidus thought probably unassociated with an Aeon, came to a stop behind the Fayth of Ifrit, eyeing Tidus blackly. "Should they not be afraid, when you are well on your way to becoming what we spent so long trying to defeat?"

"I'm what?"

"You are assembling pyreflies, feeding your power with your anger and hatred. You suck in pyreflies and use them to form armour around your soul, just like the _first_ Sin."

His stomach dropped out under him. Tidus felt sick. He could feel them. The pyreflies inside him, buzzing angrily like hornets.

"You saturate yourself with evil." The old Fayth's voice was rising. "You create Sin with your every thought, and yet you _dare_ to prey upon the power of the High Summoner Yuna?"

There was something in the Fayth's voice that clicked. Tidus gaped.

"Are you _jealous_? You're in love with Yuna?"

The Fayth's scowl became thunderous. " _How dare you..._ "

"You are! You're the one who's been trying to pull me apart everytime I touch her!"

"The elder is correct to separate the High Summoner and something as vile as Sin!" Ifrit's Fayth cut in with a snarl.

"That's ridiculous! I never needed to pull pyreflies into me before your elder there started wrenching them from me!"

The old Fayth pulled himself up, raising his staff with black rage painted all over his face. "And now you use your powers to bring alien beings into this world and occupy the sacred ruins of Zanarkand with an army of heretics!"

"What are you _talking_ about?"

"I will stop you now, before all of Spira is ravaged by your black power!"

Light blasted out of the top of the staff, and the pyreflies inside Tidus roared and wrenched out, streaming from his body like shrapnel from an explosion.

He was probably screaming. He couldn't hear.

Cecil looked furious, drawing his sword and dashing towards the old Fayth, his mouth moving and shouting something. The Fayth lowered his staff quickly, sending the light crashing into him, and Cecil hunched over as if in pain.

Tidus thought he saw Golbez running, reaching out to Cecil, and then the world went white, and it blinked out.

* * *

When Tidus opened his eyes, he thought he was floating.

He whirled around, seeing endless grey stretching in all directions, broken only by the glimmer of arcing pyreflies.

"The Farplane," he said to himself, feeling hollow.

"Where are we?"

Cecil was hovering beside him, his image oddly solid against the flickering limbo.

Tidus swallowed. "The Farplane," he repeated. "The centre of Spira, where the departed souls go."

Cecil seemed to digest this for a while. "We're dead?"

"It's... hard to say," Tidus said slowly. "I don't feel any pyrefly energy from you. It's possible that you've been sent here physically by the Fayth." He nodded at Golbez, floating a short distance away. "Both of you. As for me..." He paused. "Well, I was never really alive to begin with."

"Hmph," a voice behind him growled. "You crying again?"

His heart leapt up into his throat, and Tidus spun around.

He looked the same as ever, scars and tattoos standing out so sharply against the grey around him. Jecht narrowed his eyes, eyeing him critically.

"Have you been eating enough, boy? Maybe if you weren't so damn skinny, you wouldn't be such a crybaby."

Tidus closed his eyes tiredly. "Shut up, dad. I'm not crying." He felt a smile creep onto his lips.

Jecht grunted. "What happened? Ya bite the dust again?"

"The Fayth sent me here. They stripped away the pyreflies they gave me," Tidus's voice went a little hoarse, "because I was turning into Sin."

"The hell? Why would you do something like that?"

"I was angry!" Tidus shouted. He paused, and he scrubbed his forehead furiously as his eyes prickled. Dammit, he wasn't going to cry. He sighed. "I was... I don't know. I was stupid."

"So ya think you're not stupid anymore?"

Tidus took in a breath, prepared to argue, but he saw the oddly piercing look in Jecht's eyes, and he stopped. "Less stupid than before," he said.

"Tch." Jecht rubbed his ragged hair and mumbled, "Stupid kid."

He rolled a shoulder nonchalantly. "Yo, Golbez. What are _you_ doing in the Farplane? And you brought your kid brother, too."

Golbez crossed his arms and scowled back. "Hmph. It seems our worlds have begun merging after the war. Someone else has crossed over to your world as well, and they are laying waste to the land."

Jecht made an impatient noise in the back of his throat. "I thought they said we'd all go home when it was all over," he grumbled. "Ah, well, nothing doing. We'd better go save the world again." He swung his sword a few times. "I'm getting too old for this."

"What? What do you mean we'll go save the world?" Tidus stared at his father. "We're stuck in the Farplane!"

Jecht eyed him like he was an extra large cockroach. "You of all people should be able to see it."

"See what?"

Jecht pointed a scarred hand. "The light! It's the way out!"

Tidus looked at the white glow on the horizon, eyes wide.

"Come on, boy, get with it. Make yourself a new body, and let's get outta here."

Resisting the urge to give his father a fat lip, Tidus closed his eyes and felt for his pyreflies. Just the ones that belonged to him, he thought. No more. And he began pulling them inwards.

* * *

They emerged in Guadosalam, and Tidus barely recognized what had once been a living, breathing palace faintly lit by glowing magic-bright orbs. Now, artificial light blazed, a machina snake whirred by, and Tidus thought he'd jumped a foot into the air.

"Once a wuss..." Jecht muttered behind him, and Tidus glared fiercely.

A member of the LeBlanc syndicate walked by, froze, and did a double take. "Hey," he said, "aren't you—?"

Jecht pushed past the befuddled man casually. "So sorry for dropping in unannounced. We'll just see ourselves out, yeah?"

They hurried out of the manor, ignoring the bewildered looks of several LeBlanc people.

"I guess some of them are still staying here, even after LeBlanc moved out," Tidus said, mostly to himself.

"Who are all these kids, anyway?" Jecht demanded. "Where are the Guado?"

Tidus thought for a moment, and he shook his head, pressing on into the perpetual twilight. "A lot has changed since your time, old man," he said.

Jecht scowled at him, and Tidus rested his hand on the hilt of his sword.

"Do you have a destination in mind?" Golbez interjected with surprising tact, speaking rapidly.

Tidus shrugged. "The Fayth mentioned an army in Zanarkand. Might as well start there." He turned his face north, still feeling Jecht's eyes on him, and he sighed. It was going to be a long trip.

* * *

Tidus stretched, feeling every bone in his body pop back into place after being jarred into soup on the back of a chocobo.

They tethered the birds to some trees and left Golbez tending to them (he had turned out to be surprisingly good with the animals, and he muttered something about a ranch back home), and Cecil portioned out some travel rations and jerky obtained from the LeBlanc syndicate members, who had been only too happy to see them go. Jecht had said it was because they knew what was good for them, but Tidus secretly thought it was because they knew just as well as he did that wherever he went, trouble was soon to follow.

They'd made good time, though, and had stopped for the night in the Calm Lands.

Jecht plopped down beside him, resting his arms on his massive sword, and he stared off into the distance awkwardly.

Tidus looked at Cecil, and in spite his frantic attempts at telepathic communication, the paladin gave him what looked suspiciously like a smirk, and he stood up, patted his hands off, and announced loudly that he was going to take the first watch. Tidus watched him walk off. Cecil resembled his brother a good deal, sometimes, he thought bitterly.

Jecht cleared his throat like an ominous rumble of thunder.

Tidus bit back a sigh, and he stared at the ground. He closed his eyes, felt inside him, and smiled, satisfied that there was no longer any trace of the Fayth's hold over his pyreflies.

"Ya keeping well, then?" Jecht said.

Tidus thought about this a bit. "I'm fine. Officially I'm Yuna's full-time bodyguard."

"She'll keep you on your toes," Jecht said, his voice oddly warm.

"She says she keeps me out of trouble as much as the other way around."

Jecht laughed, throwing back his head and looking at him sideways. "She's a good girl. Braska would be proud."

Tidus felt an answering smile creep up.

"You keep her happy, yeah?"

"Yeah, I will."

Jecht cleared his throat again, a bit of a constipated look on his face, and Tidus watched him suspiciously.

"I, er, ya know. I'm proud of you, too," Jecht mumbled, after a couple of false starts.

Tidus smiled, still looking at the ground.

Jecht waved a hand wildly. "Egh, I'm no good at this stuff." He turned his face away from Tidus resolutely, and Tidus grinned. The silence that followed was comfortable. There were still lots of things, hanging in midair, that should be said, but he had a feeling that Jecht already knew what all of them were.

Jecht glanced at him sharply, then. "So, do I have any grandkids, yet?"

Tidus blushed so hard he thought his ears were steaming, and Jecht laughed over his helpless splutters.

Cecil's voice cut through Jecht's laughter, sharp as a knife. "Trouble!"

Tidus was on his feet, sword in hand, in an instant. His heart pounding, he looked down the rolling plains at the group of a dozen or so soldiers marching towards them, blades bared, and not even attempting to conceal their approach.

"That's more like it!" Jecht said, loosening a shoulder and hefting his sword. "I'll send them crying back to their mamas!"

He charged, and Tidus followed, Cecil at his shoulder.

Jecht met the soldiers with a deafening clang, sending a few of them staggering back. They attacked again immediately, though, moving in the jerky motion of puppets. Jecht cursed, and he responded with crushing kicks and bludgeoning blows, and the soldiers that went down did not get back up.

Cecil was in his dark knight form, and he stabbed forward, spitting a soldier on his blade, before kicking the limp body off and pulling back to slash through an exposed neck.

They had to kill them. Tidus knew this. The puppet soldiers would not stop until they were dead.

Two of the soldiers bore down on Tidus, and he stared. His feet felt rooted to the ground, and he glanced down at his shaking blade, held in a death-grip in both hands in front of him.

He couldn't do it, he thought. The soldiers raised their swords to hack into him, and the panic set in.

He couldn't move.

Suddenly, the soldiers faltered, stumbling a step. Tidus blinked, and they were cleaved almost in half across their spines in front of him.

"What are you doing, boy?" Jecht roared in his face, and Tidus flinched, his hands flexing around the hilt of the Caladbolg.

Whatever had afflicted the soldiers was gone now, and they surged up, aiming for Jecht's bare back.

Tidus flipped over Jecht's head, his sword biting down into the spine at the back of one of the soldier's necks, and he kicked out with his right leg, landing a blow against the side of another's head with enough force that he heard the sharp crack.

Ducking down under a vicious swipe, Tidus caught Jecht's eye for a fraction of a second, and he spun and slashed up, deep into the soldier's now open chest.

Tidus fought back to back with his father, and he thought that Cecil was wrong. This didn't get any easier at all.

* * *

Zanarkand stretched before them, looking strangely clean without the blood red sunset cast over it.

Kimahri had been surprised to see them again when they appeared at the bottom of Mt. Gagazet without having descended from the top, and with a new comrade in tow. Tidus managed to convince him that they had found out the source of the raids, and they were hurrying to stop them. The other story would have to wait. Kimahri had shaken his head, but he'd let them go.

They scaled the mountain path again, making sure to give the Fayth a wide berth, and practically snuck down the other side.

"Soldiers!" Cecil hissed, and they had their swords out and their backs to each other, glancing around warily at the ring of men facing them.

One of them was wearing an old crusades uniform, Tidus noticed, and his mouth dropped open.

"Wait! Wait!" He stepped forward, waving his hands and dropping his sword. "They're not with the foreign soldiers! These are people of Spira!"

He saw a face he recognized.

"Brother!"

The Al Bhed and ostensible leader of the Gullwings had already lowered his weapons. "Eyyy, Tidus! Good to see you!"

A mutter went through the soldiers, and their swords wavered a bit, but remained pointing in their general direction.

"Are you here to fight the weird soldiers? Is Yuna here with you?" Tidus asked rapidly.

But Yuna had already pushed through the ring of soldiers, and she paused, fear in her eyes as she scanned him for any sign of disintegration.

"Hey," Tidus said softly, reaching out and touching a lock of hair that had blown into her face. "Look, I'm all better."

"How..."

"I'm in control of my pyreflies this time, no more influence from the Fayth."

He stepped forward, folding her into his arms, and she fit comfortably under his chin. Her hands clutched in his vest. Tidus blinked furiously. He wasn't going to cry, although he thought Jecht might let this occasion go if he did.

Yuna was peeking over his shoulder, and she gasped. "Sir Jecht!"

"Hey, kid. You've all grown up."

She pulled back, staring up at Tidus. "What _happened_?"

"Eh... well... It's really a long story..."

There was a scuffling sound near the back of a group of people, and the men hurriedly shuffled aside to clear a path for what looked like a walking arsenal.

"Firion?"

"Tidus?" Firion looked just as surprised as he was. "Cecil!"

"What are you doing here? Are you in charge of these soldiers?"

Firion frowned, glanced at Jecht and Golbez, and seemed to take it all in stride. He shrugged. "I'm not sure how I got here. There was another pressure like the ones I'd been feeling for some time now, except this one was enormous, and I blacked out. When I came to, I was in this place. It's called Spira, right?"

The soldiers looked perplexed, but they had lowered their weapons, and they nodded in agreement with a ragged murmur of "Yes, it is" and "Spira".

"Did the puppet soldiers come through with you?"

Firion's face hardened. "It's the Emperor," he said grimly. "He's crossed over here, too. He's controlling the soldiers somehow." He turned and pointed out over the sparkling water to what was left of the towering buildings of Zanarkand. "He's made his base in there, and I think he's planning to conquer this land. I'd been fighting for a while, trying to get in past all the soldiers, and then these people came. They wanted to help fight, and I thought, well, it's their country, so they have every right to be here."

"So you've been laying siege to Zanarkand ever since?"

"If you can call it that. The soldiers seem to slip past us somehow. News of raids continue coming to us every day." Firion looked up as if he'd just remembered something. "I did manage to slip into the base yesterday night, though. I wounded the Emperor, and it seemed like his hold on the soldiers wavered a bit, but by then he had sounded an alarm, and I was forced to retreat because of their huge numbers."

"That must have been what happened last night!" Cecil said. "The soldiers paused in their attack for a moment."

"So the Emperor is controlling these puppet soldiers directly," Golbez said. "It seems quite obvious what we need to do."

"Take out the king, there go the pawns," Jecht put in.

Firion's gaze flicked back and forth over them. "But I already tried—"

"And you were vastly outnumbered." Tidus grinned wide, bringing a fist up into the air. "But the five of us together... we'll be unstoppable! We can have a race; see who beats the most puppets!"

Cecil huffed a sigh behind him. "This isn't a game, Tidus."

"No," he agreed, "but Spira depends on this. On us. And this is my home." He smiled at Yuna, and she beamed at him.

Firion laughed. "Whatever the reason, it's good to have you by my side again, friends."

He held out an arm, and Tidus clasped it, feeling lighter than he had in ages.

"Tonight, then," Cecil said.

"Yeah. We'll do it tonight."

* * *

TBC – And it all comes together.


	4. Reunion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 4. **Reunion**
> 
> Disclaimers still apply. I only wish they were mine.
> 
> Sorry this one took a bit longer. Some RL stuff got in the way. There are two chapters left after this, and what with school starting and a new student to supervise, my update speed is probably going to get wonky...
> 
> I haven't played Dirge of Cerberus, but I've picked up some details here and there and incorporated what I liked. :p Also, this be where the slash is. You are warned. Nothing explicit, and nothing lovey-dovey because that would be horrifically out of character, but seriously, this is a warning.

Kuja had turned out to be a surprisingly gracious houseguest, except for the time in which he'd broken the storeroom remote (Cloud kept some of the rarer weapons and materia shut away) with a little too much enthusiasm and attempted to blame Zidane for it.

Cloud hurried back towards their camp, the results of his hunt slung over his shoulder. They had reached the edge of the barren area surrounding Midgar (the more Cloud thought about the mutated monsters, the more the whole thing stunk of Midgar) by nightfall, mostly because Kuja had taken a look at the chocobos and flatly refused to touch one. Zidane had run off to collect fresh water, complaining that he was hungry enough to eat the monsters trundling around the area, and Cloud promised he would go kill something. The Devil Rides were nothing but metal, but he thought he'd seen a nest of Levikrons. They tasted of chicken, but then again, anything did to the hungry.

The jagged edges of what was left of the plate loomed ominously against the night sky, and he thought he saw Kuja speaking to Sephiroth. He started running.

He might have heard the words "rather nice, if bitchy" before Sephiroth spun on Kuja, almost snarling, the Masamune gleaming.

"Hey!" he shouted, stepping in front of Sephiroth, close enough that the Soldier wouldn't be able to get a good swing at him, and gripped his half-raised arm tightly. "What do you think you're doing?"

A long moment passed before Sephiroth's arm relaxed and dropped, and he turned away.

"Tch."

"Really, Cloud," Kuja said in a lazy drawl, "you should do something about that temper of his."

Cloud stared at him. " _I_ should do something? Like what?"

Kuja examined the nails on one hand before waving it vaguely. "I don't know. Lay him. He certainly seems to need it."

Cloud felt the air compress at Sephiroth's leap, and he flinched, pushing Kuja away and drawing the Buster. Sephiroth descend from high above, Masamune plunging towards the earth point-first, and the Buster Sword blazed orange. He spun it in his fingers, bracing himself with a wide stance, and slashed forward. The force of the blades connecting blew the surrounding rocks outwards as if hit by a gale, tumbling across the uneven ground.

The Masamune had stopped his attack, but Sephiroth's charge had been broken as well. Gathering himself, Cloud launched himself up, and the crash of their swords meeting sent vibrations down his arms.

The world narrowed to Sephiroth's glaring eyes and the fluid movement of his blade, and Cloud revelled in the air whistling past his ears as he twisted and slashed.

Down below, he thought he heard Kuja click his tongue and mutter, "Or fight him. It seems to have the same effect."

* * *

The gate to Sector 5 hung forlornly on one hinge.

Cloud led the way, trying not to think about the way Sephiroth had paused to look at the church, something unreadable on his face. He thought the man might remember more than he was letting on, but Zidane had already called him paranoid for trying to make them wait by the gate while he scouted ahead.

There had been a Dark Dragon lying in wait amongst the rubbish heaps. It had rushed them, Mu bones crunching sharply under its claws, and Cloud had felt somewhat vindicated as he cut it down with the Buster.

They had just passed the playground, where the structure that looked like a mog (he had sat on it, didn't he? With her) had been overturned, when the screech sounded behind him, and he spun around, sword ready in his hand. A Hell House bounced, engulfed in flames, and crumbled to ashes before it reached the ground again.

Kuja was heaving breaths indignantly, a hand still splayed out from casting.

"It's a house!" he said. "What is wrong with this world, where _houses_ attempt to leap upon your head?"

"You got it pretty good, though," Zidane said, peering at the smouldering stain on the ground.

Kuja was still glaring at Cloud. "I think it is high time you told us where we are going, exactly."

It was like being savaged by an irate chocobo: one of the gold ones that were strong and fast and _knew_ it. He blinked, and raised a hand to point at the plate still intact over Sector Six. "Up there." Reeve wanted to dismantle it, but it would have to wait until he'd managed to relocate everyone who would become homeless if he did.

"If the mutated monsters we have been fighting are the product of human interference, their creator will need the equipment located in the laboratories under the Shinra building, which, as you may have surmised, is above the plate," Sephiroth said in what had to be a tone calculated to infuriate Kuja in its condescension.

Zidane managed to distract Kuja by chattering loudly about how awful it must be to live under a disc all the time and never see sunlight, and Sephiroth looked at Cloud as if daring him to comment.

He bit back a sigh and began walking. "There's a place behind Wall Market where I was able to climb up to the plate a few years back. We should check to see if it's still accessible."

"And what if it isn't?" Zidane said, folding his hands behind his head and peering up through a gap in the plate.

Cloud shrugged, opened his mouth to respond, and the blare of a siren cut him off.

"Is that because of us?" Zidane yelled, wincing at the noise.

"I think not," said Kuja, looking back toward they way they had come. "I think it's because of them."

Monsters, malformed Custom Sweepers and Death Machines mixed in with rotten-looking 8-Eyes and Gremlins with sharp, spindly fingers filled the street behind them like a tide. They could hear the clanking above the noise of the siren now, and Gremlins raced ahead, chittering and screeching. One of them leapt, a claw-like hand raised up and ready to slash, and Cloud swung the Buster Sword forward to meet it.

It hit the ground with a sickening splash, and black ooze splattered back onto the monsters behind it. Five others took its place, hissing into Cloud's face, and he jumped back to avoid a gouging swipe.

Sephiroth had spit an 8-Eye, he saw, which continued sliding forward, swallowing up the Masamune as it went. He flicked his wrist, almost too fast to see, and the monster slid off in shreds.

Zidane swooped high overhead, spinning like a razor-edged top. Sparks sprayed into the air when he slammed into a Death Machine, and metal groaned as a gun-arm was sliced off and crashed to the ground.

"Get out of the way, Zidane!"

A blur whirred out of the crushed pile of metal as Kuja threw his arms forward. Green light and the muted pressure-roar of Ultima rolled through the monsters, flattening and disintegrating anything caught in its path.

He listened absently as Zidane berated Kuja for attempting to kill him, and he watched as the light of the magic faded. Debris left on the ground crunched and squealed as the next wave of monsters clambered over the remains.

Cloud raised the glowing Buster and slashed hard downward, raising a shockwave of molten blue energy that barrelled though monsters and split outward like spray.

The black liquid coated the ground liberally, now, and a Custom Sweeper slid into another with the shriek of tortured metal.

"There are too many of them!" Zidane shouted from somewhere over Cloud's head. "Where are they all _coming_ from?"

Kuja bared his teeth, the glow of Trance enveloping him, and he rose up into the air. Lightning crackled between his hands and sheeted down.

Then, bullets sprayed into the wave of monsters. He heard shouts, and he saw the blue of a suit dart by in front of him before an explosion mushroomed ahead of him and nearly knocked him flat. The Turks were walking forward, holding a steady line as they shot round after round and pausing only when a grenade rocked the earth.

Cloud touched his glove, and materia clicked as he slotted them into place. He followed behind the Turks and raised his arm into the air.

Comets streaked through the air farther off, thudding into monsters and buildings and leaving smoking craters in their wake.

There were more behind them. They began to charge, jostling and cutting into each other as they rushed toward the Turks.

"Cloud!"

He turned, and Reeve looked blearily back at him, a machine gun cradled in his arm.

"This way!"

They followed Reeve as he dashed toward Wall Market, Sephiroth turning once to cut down, with an efficient slash, a monster that had rushed too close, and the Turks brought up the rear, hastily reloading as one of them cast spell after spell into the wall of monsters as cover.

Mangled metal loomed high overhead like an enormous junk heap where the entrance to Wall Market had once been. Cloud slowed uncertainly, but Reeve grabbed hold of his arm and ran straight at the mounds.

"Open up!" he shouted.

Part of the wall of metal seemed to roll away, and Cloud saw the other openings now, the ones with firearms and eyes peering out of them. The siren was even louder here, and Cloud felt his hearing begin to shut down in defence. The monsters were following still, but they stumbled and veered, as if disoriented by the noise.

Cloud pushed Zidane in through the opening first, after Reeve, and then there were five Gremlins in midflight, leaping at him. He slashed up, neatly decapitating one before turning his sword and smashing three more the flat into the wall beside him. He wasn't going to be able to block the last one, he knew, and so he kept turning, manoeuvring himself until he would take the slash to his left shoulder and he would be able to keep fighting if need be.

The blow never came.

Something slammed into his back, and Cloud staggered, steadying himself with a hand on a twisted pipe. He looked back, and he saw Sephiroth flick black sludge off the tip of his blade. There was a thin, deep gash across his chest, white around the edges, but beginning to leak blood.

"Get in here!"

Cloud ducked into the opening when he head Reeve yelling. Sephiroth slipped in after him, and Reeve and a couple of Turks pushed what looked like a bank vault's door back into place and bolted it shut.

"Okay, now! Now!"

Every weapon in the wall opened fire at once, shredding through the monsters outside. There were screeches, and thuds when something rammed into the wall, and slowly, the noises outside began to fade away.

He felt eyes boring into his skull, and Cloud glanced up. Sephiroth had a hand pressed to his chest, the glow of a Cure bright in the gloom, and he was looking at Cloud with an odd scowl on his face, as if something had confused him and he couldn't figure out what it was so that he could attack it. Cloud wondered if he should thank him or tell him that that was a stupid move, but Reeve was shutting off the siren and turning to him with a weary sigh.

"Thank the Planet you're safe, Cloud. I've managed to get into contact with the others, but all communications seem to be cut off from Kalm."

"The monsters must have taken out the PHS towers there."

"I'm glad you came here, then. We could certainly use the help."

Cloud looked around at the pale faces clustered around them, realizing that contrary to his first thought, they weren't soldiers at all. Here and there, MPs watched him stolidly, a hint of relief in their eyes, and the Turks were looking on almost indulgently (Reno waved his electro-mag rod at him), but the majority were civilians, their hands clenched tightly around their guns and their feet shifting restlessly, eagerly.

"Have you been barricaded here for long?"

"It's been several weeks now. The monsters killed a lot of people, but we managed to round up everyone who survived and evacuate who we could. Then the monsters started amassing like that, and..." Reeve shrugged. "We haven't been able to get anyone out since then."

"What do you know about the monsters? Are they being made? Do they come from above the plate?"

Reeve's face darkened. "Is it that obvious? Yes. I saw him."

"Saw who?" Zidane said when significant looks passed over his head without further clarification.

"Hojo. A former Shinra scientist who injected himself with Jenova cells. By the end, he was far less human than monster, not that he started out much human," Reeve said.

Cloud clenched his fist as the old, familiar wave of revulsion swept over him. "We thought we killed him a few years ago. Guess we didn't kill hard enough."

"Hojo," said Sephiroth softly. A grin crept over his face, black and feral with anticipation.

Reeve sighed and grimaced. "Right now, we can't even get close to him. He's making the monsters as if he's stocking up for the winter. I doubt he can control them, but he drops them on us and stands back to watch." He waved a hand around. "This is actually what's left of the plate over sector 8. It swung around and piled, and I think it might reach up to the top of the plate. I've asked the Turks to search out a path for us, but it's been a lot of dead ends and scouring through debris so far."

"Supplies?"

"We're rationing and should be alright for another week or so, but then..." Reeve nodded upwards. "Hojo has men with him. Mercenaries, I think, shot up with mako. We've been able to steal some food from their stores, but they've become more vigilant now, and the monsters are everywhere, and the last Turks who went on a raid never came back." His voice had sped up by the end and taken on a hysterical tinge.

"Hey, it's okay," Cloud said, gripping Reeve's shoulder. "We'll get Hojo. We've done it before, and now we have even more help." He nodded to his companions. "Zidane and Kuja are capable fighters, and Sephiroth..." He paused, a bit awkwardly. Reeve hadn't known that Sephiroth had resurfaced.

"He fought them. There's nothing else that I need to know."

Cloud smiled crookedly. He sometimes forgot that Reeve knew Sephiroth, the sane one, anyway, from before... before.

"I'm sorry I'm late, but we're here now, so put us to work. If you're having trouble with pseudo-Soldiers during your outings, then you set another pseudo-Soldier on them. Simple."

"That simple, huh?" Reeve reprimanded, but he was smiling. "Thank you. Let's, er... mosey."

* * *

The mercenaries had turned out to be a joke, their mako addictions taking them well on the way to breakdown. They were still strong as Soldiers on hypers, though, and after the first raid and Elena nearly having her neck broken, he'd insisted on running the missions without the Turks.

Cloud locked the blade of the broadsword Hojo's mercenary was brandishing inexpertly by shoving the Buster upward until he hit the other man's crossguard. Twisting, he disengaged and swung around, his sword biting deep into the man's neck. There was a grunt behind him, and he rolled. The attacker had swung with enough force that the ground under the spot Cloud had just been standing had dented downward. He brought a knee up and punched forward into the narrow point of the man's sword arm, and the crack of bone shattering was decidedly audible. The mercenary staggered back, his broadsword clanging to the ground, and Cloud stepped hard into the lunge.

"Are you quite finished?" Sephiroth drawled behind him.

Cloud shot him a glare before turning and rolling the dead man off his blade. He saw the severed arm lying in front of Sephiroth and the bloodied tips of his long hair and he scoffed under his breath. At least Cloud was neater than that.

He hit the switches that flipped open the tops of the storage bins lining the room, and he pulled out a couple of sacks of what felt like grains.

"Here, take these. I'll grab that box, and let's get back."

He looked up when Sephiroth made no move to help.

He was doing it again. That weird, kind of inward, kind of puzzled look.

"Hey," Cloud said, and mako-green eyes sharpened into focus.

"'Hey' what?"

"Grab these sacks."

"You don't like to say my name, do you, Cloud?" Sephiroth drew out his name, round and almost malicious.

Cloud blinked in confusion. "What? Of course I can say your name."

"You have not addressed me since the first night after I sought you out."

He rolled his eyes. "Alright, Sephiroth. Now will you help me carry these?"

"Perhaps it bothers you, attempting to reconcile who I am with the person you thought I would be."

"Save the armchair psychology for when we get back to base," Cloud said sharply.

The smug smile he got back made his blood boil.

"Very well, Cloud."

* * *

He knew Sephiroth was trying to provoke him. And he could, too. Cloud couldn't remember the last time he'd lost his temper and raised a blade against any other person. Maybe that's what Sephiroth wanted, some kind of no-holds, glorious, cock-pit fight. It didn't feel like that was it, though, and it didn't explain why Sephiroth looked at him like that, like he was a problem to solve.

He couldn't ask Zidane about it. There was something beautifully simple, not stupid, about Zidane. He wanted to keep that intact. Kuja would probably know, but Kuja... was definitely out of the question.

And so Cloud sat alone, watching, and his thoughts a confused jumble. He had thought he'd known who Sephiroth was, growing up, from the stories and accounts and frenetic hero worship. He saw a bit of himself in the boys behind the barricade. They'd been too young to understand Meteor when it happened, too young to know Sephiroth's involvement in what had almost been the end of the world, and too young to let the cold, half-fearful attitudes of the older men around them interfere with the stories they'd grown up with about the Hero of the Wutai War.

And now, after the initial nerves had passed, they were beginning to approach Sephiroth, to ask for his advice, his stories about the war, but most of all his attention.

Sephiroth was brusque with them, but he stopped more often than not to listen.

He liked it, Cloud realized one night, when they were in the canteen and Sephiroth was looking on impatiently while a boy told a wild, gesticulation-rife story about fighting ninjas.

Sephiroth liked being a hero. Sephiroth wanted to be liked.

Cloud thought about the aloof, untouchable person he'd seen on the televised interviews, and he thought that maybe Sephiroth had been right during that mission, and that that might be a bit...

Maybe Sephiroth noticed what Cloud had figured out, after that. The weeks dragged by, and he still watched, still goaded him into fights (Cloud's ears burned at the memory of Reeve's disappointed frown after a stray Blade Beam had taken out one of the corner supports of an area behind the barricades), but he also seemed to genuinely want Cloud's opinions. Like then.

Cloud tried to speculate on whether there was a passable route that would take them undetected above the plate, and he couldn't help but feel a bit stupid because he knew he didn't have anything new to contribute that the others hadn't already thought of. But he tried anyway, because he could see that Sephiroth was listening, taking in what he thought, as if they really were old war buddies.

Cloud got it, then, and he was shaken.

He didn't say anything, mostly because he wouldn't know what to say even if he tried.

Reeve had asked them to check out a new section of tunnel that Zidane had sniffed out (Zidane said he was good at finding things because of his time as a professional treasure hunter and actor extraordinaire), and Cloud had went without complaint.

He'd flinched too much when Sephiroth had nudged him with a knuckle and indicated that he was going to scout down the right fork, but if Sephiroth noticed, he hadn't shown it.

The tunnel was tight, and it smelled of sewage.

Actually, it smelled kind of familiar, but Cloud couldn't place it, exactly. It wasn't until he spun around, right into the cloud of Abnormal Breath that the Unknown2 spewed out at him, that he remembered the Gelnika.

He always felt fudged and bemused when Confused, as if there was a bit of him on the inside looking out and screaming to take over, even though everything outside was fine. He took a slash at the enemy... blob... thing in front of him, and he was perplexed when his strike was blocked with a clang. Did his enemy use swords?

The voice inside was yelling itself hoarse, but all he could really make out were the words "Masamune", "not enough room to manoeuvre", and some furious cursing. He felt like giggling, and he looked up at the spiky blob leaning down at him. Something black got in the way.

There was an odd schk sound of needles piercing skin.

The haze lifted, and he was looking up at Sephiroth. He had his back to the monster, and he scowled at Cloud as the Unknown2 wrenched free from its bite. There were sick popping noises as a few needles pulled free and remained embedded in Sephiroth's back.

Cloud caught Sephiroth when he staggered, and he dragged the man along awkwardly as he rolled out of the way of a second bite. Leaving Sephiroth bracing himself against the side of the tunnel, Cloud swung around and slashed up, shearing off most of the Unknown2's spikes.

It screamed, reeling back, and Cloud stepped forward again, the orange burn of the Buster leaving lingering afterimages as he slashed down, across, and across again.

* * *

He managed to drag Sephiroth back to the base after the monster was dead.

The man had been almost delirious from the poison in the needles by the time they'd gotten back, and he'd called Cloud "Zack" a few times. Cloud had ignored him, and he told himself that he really needed to carry a Heal around with him from now on.

He'd dumped Sephiroth onto his cot face down and rummaged through Sephiroth's pack until he found an antidote. Sephiroth had sighed and relaxed after he'd poured the stuff down the man's throat, and now he was finally sitting still while Cloud plucked the poisoned needles out of his bare back.

Cloud tossed the last needle into the little pan he'd put on the makeshift table, and he felt the tension drain out, leaving him oddly hollow-feeling. He uncorked another bottle of antidote and started rubbing it into the cracked blisters on Sephiroth's back with his fingertips.

Sephiroth's skin felt inflamed and tight against his fingers, and Cloud made his decision.

"After Nibelheim," he said, his voice hoarse with disuse. He paused, cleared his throat, and tried again. "After Nibelheim, Zack and I were left at the reactor until Hojo found us. We were declared killed in action, and he took us back to his lab under the Nibelheim manor. My memories of what happened in the lab are incoherent, but I remember Zack pressing himself against the wall of the mako tank next to mine, and he would talk for hours, telling me stories about his life in Gongaga, the best places to eat in Midgar, and he talked about you."

Sephiroth sat very still, as if afraid that any sudden movements would cause Cloud to clam up.

"He broke us free four years later. He smashed through the mako tanks and pulled me out. After that... I'm not sure. He fought. He kept fighting. He beat Hollander, and then Genesis."

His fingertips still lay against Sephiroth's back, and he felt the flinch.

"And then he was going to take me to Midgar. We were going to leave Shinra, become mercenaries." Cloud swallowed. "Shinra troops were there to meet us on the cliffs outside the city. They ambushed us, and Zack died defending me." He wouldn't tell Sephiroth about the ragged, bullet-torn chest. "I managed to make it into Midgar before the mako withdrawal incapacitated me, and for a long time after that—" Cloud frowned at the tense shoulders in front of him. "—for a long time, I thought Zack's stories were my memories."

Sephiroth's arms twitched, as if he was clenching his fists.

After a moment, Sephiroth said, "Thank you for telling—"

"This is the second time you've taken a hit for me that wouldn't have left me any worse off than you are now," Cloud interrupted.

"I heal quickly," Sephiroth said into the silence that followed. He spoke slowly, a hunted tinge to his voice.

"So do I. Zack said that you thought Soldiers were monsters."

Sephiroth's head turned, and he eyed him warily. "What of it?"

"If that's the case, I'm no more human than any of you."

Sephiroth still stared at him suspiciously, and Cloud sighed. He had decided. "I know that you and Zack were lovers during the war."

Sephiroth flinched violently, and he rose, turning to face Cloud fully.

"I know what it's like," Cloud said, his voice rising to cut off Sephiroth's snarl, "being stuck down here in this rathole without a clear way to get at Hojo or even a clear plan. I know what it's like to be too strong, without anyone like you, and without any way to just let go." He raised his arms a bit, tilting his palms out toward Sephiroth. "And I know why you look at me the way you do."

Sephiroth stared at him, eyes flickering rapidly as he thought hard. "Are you..." He stopped and shook his head. "No, it wouldn't be right. Zack was... the only one there. This is different. Decorum states—"

Cloud snorted. "For the last time, Sephiroth, I'm not your Soldier. Maybe I'm your friend."

Mako-green eyes gleamed in the heavy darkness, and he barely saw the movement before a body rammed into him and smashed him back against the wall behind him with the force of a burst dam. Rough hands tore at his clothes, and teeth sank harshly into the junction between his shoulder and his neck.

Cloud hissed in pain. He tangled his hands through the long, shadowy hair falling like a curtain around him, and he fought back.

* * *

Cloud was correcting one of the civilian kids' hold on his rifle late the next afternoon, while Sephiroth made dry comments about the last time he'd held a firearm being before the kid was born, when Zidane leapt up at him with a wild whoop and mussed up his spikes.

"There's a way up to the plate!" Zidane said jubilantly. "I've found a path I don't think the monsters have ever been in! We can get up there any time! Holy Gaia, your hair really does make spikes like that naturally."

"That's excellent news!" Reeve said, and Cloud chose to ignore the thing about his hair.

"How accessible is it?" Reeve continued. "Can we bring the troops up quickly? Leaving small groups of people on any one side isn't ideal."

Zidane looked embarrassed. "Er, well, the thing is, it's kind of a tight squeeze. And you really need to be able to climb."

"What Zidane means," Kuja said, smirking, "is that this is a path that a mountain goat would reject."

"Oh shut up. It leads up, and there weren't any signs of monsters."

"I do wonder why."

"That's fine," Cloud interrupted before the argument could continue. "If Hojo is still conducting experiments up there, the results wouldn't be anything your troops could handle."

"Yeah, exactly!" Zidane said. "Kuja and I can go, no problem. We're good at climbing." He waved his tail as if in emphasis.

"I'll go, too," Cloud said.

"I, as well."

Cloud nodded at Sephiroth. "So that's four of us. We'll be more than enough to take down Hojo and his lackeys."

Reeve looked unconvinced. "Are you sure? I can contact the others—"

"We don't have time to wait for them to arrive," Cloud said. "We'll go now. Bring your best attack materia, but no fire-based spells, if Hojo's anything like last time. Anything else you can think of?"

Zidane brandished a red summoning materia he didn't remember giving to the boy (as if one Yuffie wasn't enough), and Kuja hmphed, waving the materia studded bracelet on his wrist. Sephiroth's hand closed over the hilt of the Masamune with a creak of tight leather. They hadn't spoken about the previous night, but... Yeah, he wasn't going to bring it up. Especially since Sephiroth seemed to have recovered his composure, and had taken to  _smirking_ again, even if it did turn into a small smile sometimes when Cloud ignored him.

"Looks like we're all set, then."

"Okay, follow me!" Zidane ran into the dark, his footsteps clanking against the metal panelling on the floor.

"Is that my Knights?" Cloud called after him as he followed.

There was an echoing "Heheh!" in response.

The tunnel up to the plate was as tight, vertical, and monotonous as promised. They came up out of a drain cover near the edge of the alley beside the husk of the Shinra building, and Cloud smothered a snort of laughter. This was where he and his friends had exited the tunnels and stormed the Shinra building a few years ago. History did seem adamant to repeat itself, sometimes.

A couple of mercenaries rushed out at them, broadswords waving above their heads, and Sephiroth cut through them effortlessly.

There had been a King Behemoth, too, but looking down the broken corpse left on the ground after the flashes of light, there really wasn't any doubt as to which of the materia Zidane had filched.

The Shinra building was an empty, charred shell, the glass tubed elevators shattered. Sephiroth wordlessly took the lead, and they followed him to a heavy metal door set into the wall of a lower level half-buried with rubble.

It looked bolted shut, but the metal sheared like butter under Sephiroth's assault.

Steps dropped away into the dark, farther than they could see.

At the bottom was another door, just as heavy, and sealed with a keypad at the side. Cloud pumped a Thundara through it, and as it fizzled and blew, the door slid half open, groaning. It stuck, and then chunks of it fell inward after a slash from the Masamune.

It was cold, this deep under the ground. Cloud could see wisps of his breath in front of him. The facility was silent as a tomb and sparsely lit, the light not so much illuminating as lending dimension to the shadows.

"Looks empty," Zidane said quietly.

The room was barren, and there was another staircase leading down at the side of the room.

"How far down does it go?"

Sephiroth shook his head. "I have never entered the lowest levels."

"Your Hojo character's probably down there, though, right?" Zidane peered down at the winding stairs, flashing lights set into the walls signalling each level.

"It is probable."

"Okay," Zidane said. He hopped up onto the railing, and he leaped.

Cloud looked down after him. There were clunks as Zidane caught and swung from the landing of each flight of stairs in turn, descending in rapid increments. He caught Sephiroth's eye. Well, it worked, he thought, and he swung himself over the banister.

He'd lost track of the amount of times he'd hurtled through the chilly air, and his throat was a bit raw from the rushing wind that swallowed him as he jumped, but they had reached the bottom. The door was standing half-open, and Cloud pushed it wider as he stepped through.

Hojo looked how he remembered from his cadet years, hunched back and greasy hair exactly in place. He held a clipboard, leafing through the pages as he hummed to himself, and when he looked up and saw his intruders, he looked genuinely startled.

"Sephiroth!" he said mildly. "Well, this is a pleasant surprise. The reports indicated that you were dead."

"Don't believe everything you read."

"And you, young man." He squinted at Cloud. "Oh, just a failure. I remember you."

"You've been busy, Hojo," Cloud said through gritted teeth.

Hojo waved a limp hand. "Oh, those. Mostly just failed creations. How we must suffer in the road to progress, hmm? Their bodies reject the Jenova cells and begin liquefying into a black substance in response while their rate of reproduction increases exponentially. Quite curious, really, but ultimately useless."

"And the successes?"

Hojo smiled nastily. "Why don't you see for yourself, hmm?"

Cloud spun around, raising the Buster as he turned. It wedged in between the claws of the shadowed figure slashing at his face, and while he watched, the claws extended slowly, as if oozing out of the thing's hands.

It was a Bandersnatch, Cloud realized. It had a shortened muzzle, and it looked almost human in its shape. There was the green stain of mako around its disturbingly intelligent eyes.

And it was enormously strong. Cloud pulled back and ducked away before it bore him to the ground.

"That's specimen 0089," Hojo said. "It should be able to overpower even Sephiroth in terms of raw physical strength."

Cloud found himself being pushed back, his sword twisting swiftly to deflect vicious slashes. It made no effort at hiding its attack pattern, though, and Cloud smiled grimly. He threw off another swipe and lunged forward and up, the Buster Sword glowing orange and cleaving cleanly through bone and fur as he sliced up through the monster's skull.

"Alas, it has none of Sephiroth's devious mind," Hojo commented, making a note on the pad in his hand.

Another one had been frozen solid in a spray of ice, and Zidane yelled triumphantly and he dashed forward, blades twirling in his hands. The ice shattered to pieces, taking chunks of the monster with it.

"Specimen 0435, however..."

Cloud gasped, feeling the burn of ragged slashes just under his ribcage.

Sephiroth shot him a quick look as he took the head off another one of the Bandersnatches, but Cloud gritted his teeth and ignored him. He rolled, his sword coming up in one smooth movement as he rocked to his feet, and the monster fell backward, its torso gaping and pouring some kind of foul-smelling liquid.

It had probably been a Deathclaw once, Cloud thought. He rammed the Buster through another one.

Hojo was directing them, somehow. These monsters weren't as mindless as the ones swarming below the plate.

"Oy," Zidane shouted. "Leave the monsters to us and just go get him!"

Cloud nodded, his breath rasping in his throat, and he raised his sword to point at the watching scientist.

"Hmm," Hojo said. "Tired, already?"

There were bangs and flashes of magic behind him, and Sephiroth stood beside him, black hatred roiling off of him in waves.

"Just tell me one thing before I kill you, Professor," Sephiroth said, his sword gleaming in the dim light. "How did you come back from the dead?"

Hojo scowled, looking puzzled by the question and the threat. "I did not raise you to point at weapon at your—"

"You didn't raise me at all," Sephiroth cut him off. "Now tell me before I start slicing pieces off."

"There was a dragon," Hojo said stiffly, "biting its tail. I suppose I was in the Lifestream, and it did not notice me when I approached. It stood over a figure I did not see, lying on the ground, and it burst into flames, in which I was apparently caught up."

"So it was an accident."

"It was _destiny_ ," Hojo spat. "I will not die before I finish my life's work, even if it means destroying my finest creation!"

He must have had the gun hidden in his hand, already. Cloud jerked reflexively at the retort when it fired, bringing the Buster up to block. The bullet ricocheted.

Hojo looked shocked. He sagged at the knees first, and then slid down the wall behind him, the small red spot in his forehead beginning to blossom with blood.

His eyes were still open, staring blankly at the floor.

Cloud lowered his sword slowly, and he glanced at Sephiroth out of the corner of his eye. The Soldier's eyes were fixed on Hojo's body, narrowed and bright with anger.

"Hey, uh, a little help here?"

Cloud left Sephiroth standing over Hojo, leaping up and slicing through the Bandersnatch that had been trying to take Zidane's head off from behind.

Kuja was hovering in Trance form over a mangled Deathclaw, bursts of magic slamming into it again and again.

Cloud thought he could hear Kuja muttering "Die, die, die, already," under his breath, and he noticed that Kuja was right. The thing kept trying to get back up, despite the shattered shell on its back.

Kuja pointed a finger, and this time, the glow of magic started under the cracked exoskeleton of the monster instead of in his hand. It grew brighter, filling the cracks of the shell with white spears, and the monster shrieked long and high before it exploded in a flurry of shrapnel.

Zidane spun, shearing into the soft point of another Deathclaw's neck, and it sprayed ichor into air.

He landed, panting, and looked around. "Is that all of them?"

There was a roar from behind him, and Cloud turned to see Hojo's body stand and ripple. It distended, extra limbs growing from its chest and neck as it ballooned rapidly in size.

There was a smaller blaze in front of the thing that used to be Hojo, and Cloud watched Sephiroth raise the glowing Masamune, holding it parallel to the ground. He tensed, and he sprung upward, the sword's motion leaving afterimages so that it looked like several slashes hit Hojo at once. Octaslash, Cloud recognized.

Hojo keened, and he seemed to dissolve entirely, puddling to the floor.

A Tornado spell roared by, ripping up tiles from the floor as it travelled. It swooped up the liquefied mess on the ground and splattered it against the walls with enough speed that some of it seemed to gouge into the concrete.

Cloud raised his head carefully, having thrown himself flat on the floor to avoid the spray. He met Zidane's wary gaze, and they both turned to eye Kuja.

Kuja shrugged nonchalantly. "It would have been a shame to waste a prepared spell."

Zidane growled.

Cloud had begun to stand when the pressure came, and it pressed him into the ground like a giant hand.

He gasped for air, his fingers digging grooves into the ground, and his vision wavered. The lab in front of his eyes jolted once, and then it jolted again even harder, as if he was seeing it on a screen afflicted by angry static.

And then it blinked, and it was gone.

* * *

Luneth was exhausted. He'd almost forgotten how huge the Syrcus Tower was.

He slashed at the soft belly of a Red Dragon rapidly as it turned its head to snap at Squall, striking down from above, and he jumped back out of reach as it gnashed its fangs and clawed at him. A Flare exploded in the monster's face.

There was that odd little shifting feeling inside him as he switched to Dragoon class and leaped up high over its head, equipping the Gungnir as he went. Air rushed by him as he descended, spear first. He let himself enjoy the feeling of flying for a moment, but he fixed his eyes on the head of the dragon down below.

He smashed right through its skull as the point of the Gungnir stabbed into the floor below, and he knew he was grinning in triumph.

Luneth sighed, slinging the spear over his shoulder and submitting to Terra's Curaga. The ripped feeling in his muscles subsided.

Bartz groaned beside him, cracking his neck audibly and grinning sheepishly when Luneth winced. "Are we there, yet?" he asked.

Luneth nodded, setting his teeth. "Just through there."

"Are you afraid?" Terra said softly, and she placed a gentle hand on his elbow.

"A little," Luneth admitted.

"Me, too," Terra said.

She walked by, her slight form dwarfed by Exdeath, who was waiting silently near the door, and Luneth wondered if this was what she felt every time she looked at his back like he was doing now.

He shifted, exchanged the spear for the Excalibur and the Ragnarok, and he stepped forward.

It was dark in there, especially after the glowing white of the rest of the tower.

The portal was still there, Luneth saw, sitting there malevolently and occasionally spitting out twists of black and purple fire. He couldn't see anything else.

"We knew you would come."

The dry, cracked voice seemed to come from all around them.

Fog roiled, and it collected, twisting and coalescing into the form he remembered, all floating, sticklike hair and snapping tentacles.

"You never learn, do you, little boy?" The Cloud of Darkness stared down at him, face as empty as ever.

"Maybe not," Luneth said, "but this time, it's I who has a lesson to teach you."

"Oh? And what could you have to teach us, little boy? We, who are older than time."

"Simple." Luneth paused, raising his weapons and crouching down. "You do not have a place here." And he leaped.

The Cloud of Darkness snarled, throwing a tentacle forward to meet him, and he blocked with the Excalibur while he hacked down with the Ragnarok, and the head of the tentacle flew off into the gloom while black smoke steamed out of the cut. Another thudded into his belly, knocking his breath out in a whoosh, and he tumbled to the ground, rolling while he landed.

Squall launched a quick flurry of blows to its other side, and he jumped back, ducking under the volley of Holy spells that rammed into the Cloud of Darkness's face.

It shrieked, throwing out stinging balls of black fire that Bartz weaved through as if he was dancing around raindrops. The Cloud of Darkness launched its other tentacle at him, and Bartz whirled away under it, bringing the Brave Blade up and through it with both hands.

Luneth had almost reached it when it spun around and saw him, and he managed to slash it heavily under one eye before the Particle Beam engulfed him.

He probably screamed. His skin felt like it was peeling off his body strip by strip.

A Flare slammed into the Cloud of Darkness from the side, and Luneth dropped to the ground when its attack faltered.

Frantic hands were patting his cheeks, trying to keep him awake long enough to pour an elixir down his throat. Gradually, he became aware of the tears dripping onto his face.

"Please don't cry," he said.

Terra scrubbed at her face hurriedly. "No, no, I won't cry."

"We're stronger than it, right?"

A wave of magic-laced fire bore down on them, several projectiles bouncing along with it, and Terra raised a hand. Barrier sprung up at her fingers, parting the fire around them like water around a rock. Luneth struck, his swords nearly whirring in his hands, and he deflected each projectile away.

"Yes," Terra said.

The Cloud of Darkness couldn't see out of one eye, now, Luneth saw, and it kept whipping around, trying to keep them all in view.

"Exdeath!" it screeched. "Why are you with them? Who sent you?"

Exdeath didn't respond beyond pointing his sword at it.

Luneth helped Terra up, squeezing her hand tightly before letting it go. A sword in each hand, he looked at her, and then he caught Bartz's eye. Squall nodded at him.

"We will not be defeated by children and traitors!" the Cloud of Darkness roared, glimmering blackly as it prepared to cast another Particle Beam.

Luneth was faster. He jumped into the air, swords at ready, and out of the corner of his eye, he could see Bartz and Squall doing the same. Exdeath floated behind Bartz. Terra's Trance glowed brightly, the blaze of Holy compressed in her hands as she fed it more power.

She yelled, sending it blasting forward into the Cloud of Darkness just before five swords, bright flashes of colour against the darkness, plunged down into its body.

It screamed long and loud, cracking and fading into smoke, and the ground shook.

Luneth thought it was the earthquake, at first, when he landed and couldn't stand. He sank to his knees, and it was then that he realized the pressure was choking him.

He gasped, trying to fill his lungs, as he slid down further. His vision shook and blurred, and as he peered around blearily, he thought he saw Cloud's face staring back at him in surprise through a grimace of pain.

The vision blinked out with the rest of the world.

* * *

Cecil was watching out for him, Tidus knew. He was engaging the puppet soldiers before they could reach Tidus, cutting them down quickly with his Dark Sword. Tidus was pathetically grateful, but he was here to fight, too, yeah?

Firion's arrows whipped past his shoulder, and he jumped and somersaulted, the Caladbolg a blur of movement.

The Emperor dodged easily, setting a few more flashing mines in place. He slashed his staff at Jecht, who was swinging his massive sword and flying by with wild yells of "Come on, you pansy sucker!"

There was a helmet on the ground, rolling to a stop by his feet, and Tidus sent it flying with a kick.

It sailed over the Emperor's head as he ducked, but Tidus grinned.

There was a chain of explosion, ringing the Emperor, triggered by the helmet smashing into one of the mines.

The Emperor flew out of the cloud of smoke and sent a Flare flying at Tidus. He leaped back, ducking and weaving, hopping over fallen puppet soldiers as it loomed closer and closer.

When it finally dissipated, Tidus was a long way away from the others.

He ducked under a soldier's slash at his head, and his sword cut forward into the man's gut. He jumped up, planting his feet against another soldier, pushing himself up and away while his sword bit down into the man's helmet and cut through half of his face.

He ran, crouching to lunge up into a thrust against another soldier that had gotten close enough.

Tidus saw Jecht send the Emperor flying with a heavy slash, straight into a hanging ball of Gravity magic that Golbez had planted. A flicker, and Golbez was floating over the Emperor, sword crashing down and sending purple flames arcing into the ground.

Blood was running down the Emperor's arm, staining his gold armour, and he dashed away, putting space between himself and the others before raising his staff in the air. It flashed gold as he poured power into his attack.

Cecil was behind him in a blur of movement, slashing hard and fast. Tidus hadn't even seen him move. He used his momentum to propel himself further in the air, and there was a black burst. Cecil dropped like a stone out of it, flipping and driving the Emperor into the ground as he dove.

Cecil was caught full in the chest with a fiery orange blast that pushed him back and pinned him to a wall, and the Emperor took the opportunity to shoot off another Flare at him.

Yelling, Tidus hacked down and through the spell, shielding his head as it blew and tossed debris into the air.

"You okay?" he shouted to Cecil.

The paladin nodded, breathing hard. "We've almost got him. He's moving slower now."

"Yeah," Tidus said. "You ready?"

Cecil was off in a rush of white. He slashed across and up, sending the Emperor leaping back. Jecht's sword cut deeply into his arm, knocking the staff to the ground, and he dodged, snarling, spinning in midair, to avoid a pillar of dark flames that Golbez had set under him.

Hah! Tidus hit him in the face with a barrelling projectile helmet, and the impact sent the Emperor flying back straight into the blazing arrow from Firion's bow.

It pierced through the Emperor's head, and he jerked, tumbling through the air and folding in on himself as he fell, like a marionette ripped free from its strings.

Tidus grinned widely. The puppet soldiers that still surrounded them had sagged, too, and collapsed to the ground limply.

Jecht raised a broad hand, and Tidus slapped his palm against his father's almost instinctively.

He had jumped up into the high-five, and the pressure, when it came, knocked him off his feet.

* * *

Cloud groaned, pushing his fingers into one temple to try to alleviate the pain.

Grass was green and damp under his hand, and a gentle breeze drifted around him. Cautiously, he looked up, and he stood.

Squall was staring at him, and Tidus looked like his eyes were about to pop out of his head. Chatter burst out, then, as Bartz pounced on Zidane with an excited laugh. Cecil smiled at Terra, who had reached out with glowing hands to cure him as soon as she'd seen the blood on his mouth. Luneth greeted Firion happily, and the Chaos warriors eyed each other suspiciously.

Then, Jecht harrumphed and told Kuja that he looked as ridiculous as ever, and Kuja launched into an irate diatribe about Jecht's appearance, insulting everything from his ripped trousers to his dead mother, and Jecht laughed loudly the entire time.

Cloud looked around. A castle sat at the bottom of the rolling hills, pennants fluttering on its spires.

"Where are we?" he said, mostly to himself.

Sephiroth shook his head. It probably looked like a page out of a fairytale to him, too. In the end, it wasn't Sephiroth who answered, anyway.

"This is Cornelia."

Flinching, Cloud whipped around.

Behind them, the Warrior of Light was silhouetted black against the bright sky.

* * *

TBC


	5. A Reason

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 5. **A Reason**
> 
> Disclaimers still apply.
> 
> A lot of plot resolved in this one. And I have messed around wildly with FF1 canon, but see, it was pretty vague to begin with... right?
> 
> This is what I do on a holiday when I should be sleeping in. I hope you enjoy. One more part to go! **  
> **

Everyone tried to speak at the same time.

"This is your world?"

"Why are the worlds bleeding into each other?"

"I thought it was over—"

"Why are we still doing this?"

"Is Garland—"

But the Warrior of Light had drawn his sword and pointed it at the Chaos warriors.

"Wait!"

Cecil stepped forward slowly, hands spread and eyes earnest. "Please," he said, "I believe they are not enemies."

The Warrior of Light's face remained as impassive as ever, but Cecil could see the rapid flickers of his eyes. Slowly, eventually, the bright sword lowered. His eyes shut and pinched.

"Forgive me," he said. "I have been travelling for a long time."

"Travelling? Is this not your world?"

The Warrior of Light stared hard at the castle. "It is, and yet it is not. I left a world of darkness, and I returned to a world of light, though decay eats at its foundations." He nodded at Cornelia castle. "I have discovered that here, Garland has won the princess of Cornelia and become its king. In this castle, he has ruled for fifty years."

" _Fifty_ years?" Zidane's mouth dropped open.

"It hasn't been fifty years since the war, has it?" Firion said.

"It has not. Not for me." The Warrior of Light shook his head. "I returned to a Cornelia ruled by Princess Sarah's father, where Garland was a knight of the realm who looked at me strangely, but did not yet remember me. I do not recall the manner in which I was transported to this Cornelia, but perhaps it is the land's future."

"So you were transported away from your home, too?"

The Warrior of Light looked at Luneth, and when he responded, his words were slow and uncertain.

"I cannot say if the place I first saw was my home, as I have no memories prior to being summoned to the land by the crystal of light that appeared in my hand. I do, however, trust that we have been brought here for a reason." He gestured to the area. "I have heard whispers of the king's madness."

"Then Garland is behind all of this?"

"I have not been able to enter the castle to ascertain this. He surrounds himself with skilled guards."

"What are we waiting for, then?" Tidus said, nearly bouncing on the balls of his feet. "Let's get in there!"

It took four tries and an arrow through his shoulder (Tidus gritted his teeth and pulled it out, ignoring Jecht's badly camouflaged mother-henning) before Tidus admitted that the direct approach wasn't working out very well and they probably needed another strategy.

"Okay, how about this," he said, "we'll get Firion to fire up a few lines on this side of the castle, while Cloud goes and makes a distraction on the opposite side."

"Why me?" Cloud said sharply.

"You've got the flashiest attacks I've ever seen. I don't know anyone else who can shoot meteorites out of his sword."

"What about—"

"I'm sorry, Cloud," Cecil said, "but Tidus has a point. I will accompany you." Golbez followed immediately, moving a bit too quickly for it to be casual.

And because Sephiroth looked as if he was smothering his snickers and finding it hard going, Cloud shrugged and slung his sword over his shoulder.

"Fine. Don't miss the signal."

"What will the signal be?" Bartz asked.

Cloud looked over his shoulder. "You'll know when you see it."

* * *

In fact, Luneth thought, the only way they could have missed the signal was if they were deaf and blind. And buried in a cave miles away and far below the ground. He had thought the sky was falling in at first. There were shrieks and running footsteps above, and once the shouted orders had faded away, Firion was shooting up a flurry of arrows, long wires attached glinting in the sunlight, Squall was yelling "Go, _go_!" and then he was over the ramparts and crouching down below the stone lining the catwalk, and his heart was hammering into his throat.

When everyone had made it over, the Warrior of Light beckoned with a quick wave.

He didn't know who thought it would be a good idea to try to move a large group of clanking warriors through a crowded castle, but when the first shouts started, and they scattered in every direction with soldiers hard in pursuit, Luneth groaned and bit back the "I told you so".

He dashed along a high-ceilinged corridor and turned a sharp corner before skidding to a stop and sticking out a leg. One of the soldiers chasing him barrelled into his boot and thudded to the ground, his helmet rolling off and presenting an easy target for Luneth's quick, sharp strikes. He ducked under a sweep of another soldier's sword, rolled, and came up running.

Pounding footsteps sounded in front of him, and Luneth's eyes widened at the sight of three more soldiers rushing toward him. He kept running, and when the soldier in front of him raised a sword with a wild yell, he leaped, bounced off the wall beside him, and soared over the soldiers' heads while propelling himself forward with pumping legs. There was a resounding crash behind him, and he let himself smile at his plan's success.

Suddenly, there were more soldiers, flanking him in the corridor. They eyed him warily, approaching with swords at the ready. Luneth watched them grimly. He was faster than them, he was fairly certain. If he could isolate them one at a time in the narrow space...

They charged, and he found himself flipping and ducking with every drop of agility he had. He caught a downward stroke with his sword and surged up, ripping deep into the soldier's arm until he dropped the blade, and then he stabbed downward into the vulnerable space between the soldier's footguard and his armour. The man screamed and toppled over backward, and Luneth spun around to block another hack at his back.

He was pressed up against the wall now, glancing about desperately for a way out, and his eyes widened at what he saw. He disengaged hastily and slid to the floor, and the flashing of a viciously fast blade over his head cast bright patterns on the floor. There was barely any noise but for the splatter of blood. A spray hit him across the nose, and he blinked rapidly at the burn.

Luneth looked up at a wall of black leather and silver hair.

Sephiroth was staring down at him, eyes blazing bright from his battle-high, and Luneth thought that he would probably be able to take on the Soldier if he attacked in such tight quarters, but then Sephiroth turned his head away in clear dismissal.

That stung a bit, but Luneth concentrated on swallowing down the laugh that tried to force its way up his throat. He wondered if that much arrogance weighed the man down when he walked.

Sephiroth jerked his head at him and walked away, leaving Luneth to pull himself up and follow.

* * *

Firion found Squall holding off a ring of soldiers with relative ease.

The bangs of the gunblade firing punctuated the clangs of metal on metal, and a soldier staggered backward and collapsed to the ground. When the soldier in Squall's blindspot rushed forward to stab, though, Firion hurled his axe. It slammed into the man's side and carried him a good half metre away before he crumpled.

Pulling a spear in to his hand, Firion spun into the soldiers in a rush of sharp edges, and over the cries and shouts as he focussed his attacks on any weak points he could find, he thought he heard Squall's quiet grunt of acknowledgement. A warm back pressed into his shoulder briefly as Squall recoiled under another blast from his gunblade.

Firion thrust the point of his spear forward, crushing through a soldier's armour, and he wrenched the spear out and to one side to smash it into another soldier's neck.

When Jecht barrelled into the room, trumpeting and gouging grooves into the walls with his massive sword, Firion heard him well before he appeared.

Tidus dashed in, not far behind, and then he was twisting and flipping over their heads, sword glittering and feet kicking out to catch a soldier under the chin. His helmet went flying off, accompanied by the sharp thud of his body hitting the floor.

"Haha!" Tidus yelled over the clatters and the bangs. "Eight!"

"I wouldn't laugh yet, boy!" Jecht shoved Firion backward with a heavily scarred hand and laid into what soldiers were left with crushing blows. "Eleven!"

"Hey! That one was mine!"

Roaring with laughter, Jecht rushed off, and Tidus followed at a dead sprint, his face set in grim determination.

Firion retrieved his axe and wiped the smears away on the dead soldier's clothes before hooking it back onto his belt.

He glanced at Squall's dry expression and chuckled. "Like father, like son," he said.

Squall rolled his eyes in response, and they fell into step, following the sounds of smashing doors and anguished screams trailing in Jecht and Tidus' wake.

* * *

Terra skipped backward, dodging the short hails of arrows arcing toward her. She spun, flames enveloping her hand, and several burst into fire and crumbled to ash in the air. A sizzling line sprung from her feet and darted forward, exploding in a wall of fire underneath the pursuing soldiers.

The ones who had barely missed the blast rushed forward, yelling, and there was a bright flash in the corner of her eye.

The Warrior of Light braced himself, catching the downward strikes on his sword and pushing hard. The soldiers' charge stopped with a clang, as if they had hit a wall.

Another group of soldiers were dashing down the corridor from the other way, and Terra clenched her fists, magic glowing.

Bartz rushed into the soldiers, ducking low and hacking at uncovered knees, and they toppled over in a flailing heap. He leaped back, parrying a blow from a limping soldier who had rolled away from the impact in time, and slashed hard, leaving a gaping gash over the man's chest. Another soldier struck at him, and he caught the blade on his, twisting his wrist to push it up and out, and he headbutted the man hard in the nose. It crunched satisfyingly.

Towering shards of ice smashed down into the soldiers on both sides, and icy winds whipped at Terra's hair as she held her hands out, directing her attack, until they lay still on the ground.

Footsteps approached her steadily, and she whipped around, lightning crackling around her hands.

Exdeath stopped and looked at her placidly, making no move for his sword. Uncertainly, Terra let the magic dissipate.

A crash and a thud, and there was an unconscious soldier sliding down the wall across from the bend in the corridor. Zidane dashed around the turn, tail whipping madly to keep his balance as he pivoted. He paused, seeing the crumpled soldiers, straightened up and smiled.

"Guess that's the last of them!" he said, knives twirling in his hands. "Me and Kuja—" He frowned and peered back the way he came. "Hey, Kuja! Any slower?"

Kuja came into view, pushing back his hair with an irritated expression. " _What?_ You left me with four of them surrounding me, and I had to bring the ceiling down to crush them all."

"I knew you could take them," Zidane said, biting back a grin, and Kuja bared his teeth, magic crackling in his raised hand.

A wall caved in with a billowing cloud of dust, and there was a thud and a grunt as a body rammed into the opposite wall.

"The hell, kid? You call that a kick?" Jecht stepped away from the dent his impact had made in the stone, rolling a shoulder ominously. " _This_ is a kick!"

Tidus leaped and twisted over Jecht's leg, bringing his Caladbolg down hard towards Jecht's head and shuddering to a stop when Jecht blocked with his sword.

Firion climbed through the hole in the wall, brushing off splinters and rock dust from his hands absently. Behind him, Squall stepped into the corridor and sighed.

"They're still going at it?"

Down the hall, Luneth gasped and flattened himself against the wall as a fireball whizzed by until Sephiroth batted it away with a gloved hand. It burst against a high, narrow window and sent slivers of rock showering down.

Kuja didn't notice, more magic fire jumping from his fingers, aiming for Zidane's tail. The boy laughed like a maniac, dancing around the fallen soldiers.

"Enough."

Tidus jolted and fell awkwardly in mid-leap, and he eyed the Warrior of Light guiltily. He didn't look angry, but he _never_ looked angry. That made it worse, somehow.

Terra healed a slash on his wrist, and Tidus beamed down at her gratefully.

She laughed. "It's always your group that has the reckless ones," she said.

Firion made a noise of protest.

"We should go," said the Warrior of Light. "There may be other guards, and we should find the others."

"Sorry, Light," said Terra.

The Warrior of Light shook his head, and a smile ghosted over his face.

"Cloud and Cecil have probably made it into the castle," Bartz said, nodding. "They could be anywhere."

"He is down on a lower level," Sephiroth said. He gazed back patiently when the others stared at him.

"Who? Cloud?" Tidus said incredulously. "Do you have some kind of homing radar?"

"What's a radar?" Zidane said.

Sephiroth lifted a sharp eyebrow, but did not respond otherwise.

* * *

Cloud, Cecil, and Golbez were standing at the bottom of a spiralling staircase when they found them.

"Hey, Cloud!" Zidane shouted, hopping down over the railing. He blanched at the red liberally coating Cloud's skin and clothing. "Are you alright?"

Luneth had reached out, healing magic lighting up his hands, before Cloud gently pushed them down and shrugged.

"I'm fine," he said. "It's not mine."

Goosebumps prickled over his neck when he met Sephiroth's dark, focussed eyes, and Cloud turned his head away quickly.

"Where to next?" he said.

The Warrior of Light pointed to the door next to Golbez. "The king's quarters should be located through that door, but be wary; he stations his generals close to him."

Cloud nodded, hefting the Buster. He stood in front of the heavy doors and glanced around. The other warriors looked back at him, their faces set and ready. Tidus's grip tightened on the Caladbolg as he vibrated with energy. Luneth furrowed his brows under the forehead protector of a ninja, glittering swords crossed in front of his chest. The Warrior of Light nodded at him, blue eyes fierce and bright. He caught sight of Exdeath, lingering back behind the others and watching almost passively, and he frowned.

He turned to the door, slashed once, hard, with the Buster Sword, and he kicked the sheared pieces in.

They'd been waiting, he realized quickly, moving aside and allowing the others to enter and form a rough front with him. Then, there was a general in silver armour snarling in his face and slashing down at his chest, and Cloud moved.

Luneth danced aside as a Quake split the floor under his feet. One of Garland's generals sneered at him, almost skeletal under the black armour, and he swung his massive sword like a bludgeon. Luneth leaped over the swing, catching hold of the man's should to propel himself up and strike hard and fast at the general's face. The man brought back his arm to swat at Luneth, and he skidded back under the weight of Golbez's strike, sparks flying up into the air.

Luneth fell back, seeing Terra float up, magic buoying her and crackling down her arms. She whispered something, and her face set in determination. Fireballs blasted forward, curving around Golbez and sticking fast to the general.

The man glanced down and around, fury and fear battling for dominance on his face, and Golbez took the opportunity to run his sword straight through the general's ribcage. He pulled back and watched while the general shuddered, screamed, and vanished in an inferno that burned up quickly enough to leave blurred afterimages.

Cecil raised a hand to shield his eyes on the other side of the room, and then he quickly jumped back, raising his sword to block the wicked curved blade the general in red armour wielded. She leaned in close, laughing breathily as she stared into his face, and raised a hand with fire dripping down its length like bright water. He recoiled, pulling back and slashing down her arm, where the Dark Sword turned the fire black.

Blood ran down her arm, and she paused. She licked at her fingertips, eyeing the black fire, and turned gleaming eyes to him again.

"Interesting..." she said.

The black flames burned higher, and Cecil's eyes widened.

Squall was on her in an instant, pushing her back with flashing strikes and echoing gunfire. The general laughed again, blocking a slash and countering wildly, her sword heavy enough to chip the pillars behind her. A flicker, and Kuja was rearing behind her, Holy blazing in his hand. She whirled around, sword coming up, and she jerked.

Firion's axe struck her again coming back, knocking her off balance, and then Squall's glowing blade hacked down her side, triggering an explosion of magic under her feet, and Holy rained down on her.

Zidane ignored the explosions rocking the room, and he rocketed forward, one knife reaching under the blue-armoured general's sword and slapping it out of balance, and the other knife coming forward and scoring a jagged line through the man's breastplate. He used the momentum to push himself up, landed briefly on the man's raised arm, and somersaulted back to avoid the crashing tide of water that surged up in front of him.

The Warrior of Light darted under him, breaking through the water spell with a quick thrust of his shield. He stabbed at the general's arm, piercing the heavy armour and nicking the skin under before the man pulled back and dodged the rest of the attack. He moved surprisingly quickly for such an enormous man, Zidane thought.

Then the general jolted, armour crunching and crushing down under the force of Jecht's slash.

"There ya go!" Jecht crowed, lifting a foot and kicking the general hard enough to smash him headfirst in to the wall.

The man turned, the blood running down his face darkening his face more than his expression, and he reached down, magic started to gather in his hands despite the one hanging limply by his side.

Zidane saw the flashes in the corner of his eye and ducked as molten bright swords burst into the air and hovered, pointing toward Garland's general.

"Light!" the Warrior of Light cried, swinging his sword sharply to drive the glowing blades straight through the general and pinning him to the wall behind him.

Cloud moved back slowly, twisting and blocking to avoid the last general's two-bladed style. She bared her sharp teeth at him, white hair flying over silver armour, and she spun both swords and chopped downward at him. He caught the blow on the flat on the Buster, twisted it off and slashed up into the gap in her attacks he'd created. She leaned back and tilted her head up, the tip of the Buster Sword missing her chin by a hairsbreadth.

She whipped around, parrying and throwing off Sephiroth's rapid attacks with enough vicious force to strike sparks off their blades.

The general stepped back, her swords a bright blur in her hands, and a torrent of spinning wind dug into the ground and bore down on Cloud.

Cloud spun the glowing Buster in his hand and waited. Then, he swung forward hard and fast, and the cyclone from his attack barrelled into the general's, counterspinning and destabilizing the funnel. It wobbled, and the merged whirlwinds blew apart into a blast of wind that knocked both Cloud and the general off their feet.

She struggled to stand, and Tidus yelled, diving forward. The Caladbolg smacked into both the general's swords and bore them to the ground, while at the same time, Sephiroth lunged forward, swinging the Masamune up and around in a blindingly fast slash.

She stood still for a moment, a look of surprise on her face, and then she fell backward, her head wobbling and sliding cleanly from her neck.

Cloud picked himself off of the ground, breathing heavily as his lungs recovered from the blast.

There was a small, wooden door set into the wall at the back of the room, and he reached out, pushing until the flimsy latch on the inside gave and clattered to the floor.

The warriors walked into the king's chamber.

There was a huge, low bed occupying the majority of the room, and on it, a still, frail body lay. Long white hair hung off the side of the bed, and Cloud could tell it was true white, not the thin grey of old age.

The warriors fanned out, surrounding the bed on all sides.

"Is he dead?" Bartz whispered, after a while.

Eyes cracked open, and in the slit between the paper-thin eyelids, Cloud could see clear, sky blue.

"So," said the hoarse, cracked voice, "you've made it past the Four Fiends."

"The what?" Tidus said, tilting his head to one side. The generals hadn't looked anything like the fiends he was used to.

The king laughed. "They were Chaos's minions once, but they were loyal to me. They chose—" His voice broke off into harsh coughs, and the king's body shook on the bed.

"Garland," said Terra. She pressed her hands to her mouth and looked down at the wasted form, conflicting emotions flickering through her eyes.

"Are you causing this breach between our worlds?" The Warrior of Light stared down at Garland oddly, as if he saw something familiar that he could not quite place.

Garland scoffed. "I am dying. How could I be responsible for a breach between worlds?"

"I have information—"

"They think me mad," Garland said, as if he hadn't heard the Warrior of Light. "They shut me away in here and they do not listen. Because I warned them. They do not listen, but I warn them."

"Of what do you warn?"

Garland fixed the Warrior of Light with sharp blue eyes, and the veil of dementia raised. "How strange it is that such simple decisions can lead to such different fates?" he said, a dry smile on his face. "You and I were once the same person, but when I walked down the path of Chaos, you were brought into my world from one parallel, in which I had chosen the path of the unambitious. You were brought here to stop me."

The slack, utterly stricken look on the Warrior of Light's face was new, Tidus thought.

"It is true," Garland said, stare strong and unblinking. "The crystals thought the only one who could stop Chaos was one who could have become Chaos himself." He settled back onto the bed with a sigh, oblivious to the stunned silence around him. "In this timeline, you stopped Chaos and his Four Fiends before I tasted the fruit of corruption. You saved me as well as the world of light, and when I became ruler of Cornelia, I thought myself firm, but just. Over time, I regained my memories of a time that did not exist, and when it happened this time, I recognized it. I took his Fiends for myself." Garland laughed long and harshly, the wild light back in his eyes. "I _warned_ them."

The Warrior of Light swallowed hard, as if his mouth and throat were paper dry. "Warned them of _what?_ " he asked again, and his voice was hard and edged.

Garland turned to look at him, and his eyes were wide and blue in the low light. "He came here. He could not stand the thought of dying and decaying like me, and so he came here and he is trying to start it all again. The endless war." He wrenched, suddenly, and his mouth slowly filled with blood, so that when he smiled, his teeth were black and red. " _Chaos_ ," he whispered.

Tidus stared at the blue sword impaled through Garland's chest, and he followed the line of it up a blue-armoured arm to a blue-armoured helm.

Then all hell broke loose.

Tidus clutched the Caladbolg in his hands, and he backed away with the other warriors, facing an impassive Exdeath who still stood over Garland's murdered body.

Zidane was shouting on his other side, while Bartz raged and demanded an answer.

"Who are you working for?" Luneth cried out, his voice high and brittle.

"Hmph," Exdeath said, jerking his sword free of the bed. "The Void beckons, and Chaos has promised me that this will be the true end. He sent me to follow you, to rid the world of the scum who, like short-sighted little insects, scurry to further their own ends as soon as their God does not command their every move. You have exterminated those that stand in Chaos' way, and now, once I destroy you, the cycle will be complete."

"What makes you think you can trust Chaos? He ordered you to help kill your allies! He's trying to restart the cycles, and once that happens, there will _never_ be an end!" Bartz shouted, and he leapt at Exdeath with the Brave Blade extended in a rushing thrust.

Exdeath slashed, and Bartz managed to catch the blow on his sword, but the swing continued, and he felt his feet lift off the floor.

Shielding his head, Bartz smashed through the shutters over the large window facing out toward the castle grounds, and he dropped down out of sight.

"Bartz!" Luneth glared at Exdeath. Not again. Never again.

Magic burst from his hand, and streamers of Flare rushed toward Exdeath. The armoured giant deflected the spells with heavy swings of his sword, turned, and leaped out the window.

Luneth dashed over and peered down past the demolished window frame. He breathed a sigh of relief. Bartz was spread-eagled on the sloping roof top below, clinging with his fingers and looking up at him.

"Bartz!" he shouted.

Bartz shook his head. "Don't worry about me! Exdeath! Don't let him get away!"

Nodding, Luneth hopped up on to the window sill, and he jumped, skidding down the roof next to Bartz in an avalanche of sliding tiles. Bartz let go and slid down the roof after him, dropping to the ground and rolling. Bartz pulled him to his feet, and they both began the chase.

A moment later, Zidane shot by them, bounding along the ground in great leaps.

Cloud passed in a black blur of speed.

When they caught up, Cloud had already engaged Exdeath. They exchanged crushing blows, heavy slashes thundering into each other's blades or rocking the ground. Zidane whirled over Exdeath's head, his two-bladed weapon flashing and burst of fireballs spraying.

Bartz saw Zidane's energy blast slam into the side of Exdeath's head, disorienting him and shoving him into the path of Cloud's strikes, and Cloud switched smoothly into his Cross Slash, his heavy sword surrounded by a corona of orange light. The attack sent Exdeath's sword flying, flipping end over end, and Bartz shouted in triumph, lunging forward when Exdeath turned to watch his sword hurtle away for a fraction of a second, and he pierced Exdeath's armour. The Brave Blade sunk in to the hilt.

Exdeath sagged, and he crumpled to the ground. Bartz let him roll off and onto his back. He fell back, gasping for breath, and his heart hammered in his ears.

A hand landed on his shoulder and squeezed, and Bartz looked up into Luneth's dusty face.

"Thanks," Bartz said.

He took the offered hand.

* * *

The forest was dark around them.

Tidus looked out ahead into the clearing, where crumbling stone walls supported heavy doors to a bleached white building hunched over the soft green of the grass underfoot.

It looked innocuous enough, but inside, the Chaos Shrine waited, deathly calm and menacing.

"What are we waiting for?" he said impatiently. "Let's go in."

"Wait."

The Warrior of Light glanced at him, and lowered his hand and his head. "Today," he began, haltingly, "today I discovered that I am one who could have become Chaos. That is why I am here now. I must stop Chaos, because I am him, and I am responsible for him."

"There's no way you could have ever become Chaos!" Tidus objected. "You're the most fundamentally good person I know!"

The Warrior of Light looked at him, and there was a tiny, wry twist to his mouth. "And yet you know how I adhere to the choices I make without fail."

Tidus opened his mouth, and he closed it again, rubbing his head sheepishly. "Well... There is that..."

The Warrior of Light shook his head. "It may have been so in another place, but that is not the me that exists here, and I will be here to stop this." He looked around at the warriors in turn. "That is my reason, but that is not enough for you. I want you to find your reasons. I will not drag you into my battle."

He closed his eyes and raised a hand, and then there was a glow on his fingers, and shimmering portholes appeared behind each of them. "Go home. See your world, your loved ones again. If you find a reason to fight, return here tomorrow morning, and I will be waiting here. If you choose not to fight this fight, I accept your decision with complete respect." He looked at them in turn, eyes hard. "I will not take those with me who do not have a reason in this struggle."

In the quiet, Zidane said hesitantly, "How did you do that? Open the gateways?"

"I suspect it is a power of Chaos that I am pulling from him. Go. I will keep the portals open until a few moments after dawn."

For a moment, Zidane looked as if he would protest again, but he stopped, bit his lip, and nodded. He walked into the portal behind him, showing a surf-beaten cliff on which face a dwelling was set into the stone. After a moment, Kuja smirked, and he followed.

Luneth took Terra's hand and squeezed gently before stepping away toward his portal.

"Tch." Squall slung his gunblade onto one shoulder, and he stepped through the gate behind him.

Cloud nodded to the Warrior of Light, and he walked toward the shimmering darkness, speckled with pinpricks of light like stars or flickers of Lifestream. On the other side, he lifted his face into the wind.

"What is so funny?" Sephiroth asked, behind him.

He shrugged. "The situation reminds me of another, similar one."

Sephiroth did not pry.

He raised a hand. "I'm gonna go to Seventh Heaven, see how Tifa and the others are doing. You go do what you need to, and I'll meet you back here in the morning, alright?"

"Right," Sephiroth said.

Cloud he could feel the eyes on his back as he walked away.

* * *

The wild roses were blooming, blanketing the field at Firion's feet. He inhaled deeply, the scent heady and tangible in the air.

He smiled, and he walked forward, toward the figures waving and calling his name.

* * *

Luneth walked into Kazus first. It was closest, and he needed to pick up some more cloth for bandages, as well as a few more potions.

He was barely five steps into the village when something heavy swung into his helmet, clanging loudly and jarring his skull.

"Ow!" he said, glaring at Refia. "What did you do that for?"

"What did _I_ do? What about you? Your clothes are torn again, and you've got about a million scrapes on your arms! How did you manage to do that since the last time I saw you? Are you _actually_ trying to kill yourself?"

"Refia, you probably shouldn't have been smacking him with a hammer if you didn't want him to get hurt."

Luneth turned grateful eyes to Arc. The shy boy from his village had grown quite a lot over the past year, and he stood, leaning his weight casually on one leg and resting yet another heavy book against his shoulder.

"He deserved it!"

"I am sure that Luneth is trying his best." Ingus stood on Arc's other side, arms crossed, and a hint of a smile on his face.

"He'd better, if he knows what's good for him."

Luneth rolled his eyes and let his friends' bickering wash over him.

* * *

"Cecil!"

Rosa laughed, rushing toward him, and he opened his arms to fold her under his chin.

"Are you okay? Did you solve the problem? Do you need to leave again?"

He laughed and hugged her tighter. "I will tell you everything, but it's a long story."

"Then it'll have to wait until after dinner!" Rosa pulled on his arm, tugging him into Baron Castle. As they walked, soldiers and servants paused and nodded respectfully. Cecil smiled and inclined his head in acknowledgement.

"My lord," said a deep voice behind him.

Cecil looked blankly at his friend until Kain rolled his eyes and relented.

"Cecil," he corrected.

Cecil smiled. "My friend, it's good to see you."

"If you want to keep seeing me, I suggest you do not leave for extended periods of time again. Rosa has near taken my head off in her worry."

"I'm sorry. I'll try not to generate any more life or sanity threatening situations for you."

Kain chuckled. "Then you had better start by handling the one that's happening now." He jerked a thumb back towards the castle gates. "Golbez is out there."

Cecil's smile grew. "Let him in."

* * *

"Ouch! Ouch!" Bartz protested, wrapping his arms around his head to shield himself from Boko's assault. "I said I was sorry, didn't I?"

Lenna was sitting beside him, arms crossed. "Well, what do you expect after running off on another adventure and leaving poor Boko behind?"

"Buck up, man. He missed you." Faris landed a stinging slap on Bartz's shoulder.

Krile was laughing too hard to get her words out, but Bartz thought he could make out the words "He says he's not nearly done yet" amongst the splutters.

Bartz groaned, flung his arms around Boko's neck, and plastered his face into the warm feathers.

No sympathy for the weary.

* * *

It was dark outside, but the night was warm.

Terra closed her eyes and breathed in the earthy scent of home.

The magic was much weaker here, but she could feel a tiny core of it, deep inside her. She wondered if it had come with her from the other world, and if it would fade over time. She didn't know if she was glad about that or not. It was warm and strong, terrifying still in its intensity. But...

Luneth had seen it, and he had not shrunk away. He told her they would become strong together.

Terra thought about what it meant, having something that she wanted to protect.

"Terra?"

A door opened, light spilling out onto the street, outlining a slim figure in the door.

Terra smiled, and she stepped into the light.

* * *

Cloud paused in the door, halfway into his house.

There was a light on in the kitchen.

He blinked at Sephiroth, and the Soldier watched him calmly. There was a glass of water sitting on the table, at the place where Cloud sat.

"What are you doing here?" he said finally.

Sephiroth half-shrugged, a habit Cloud was certain he must have picked up from Zack. "Where else would I go?" He stood, gathering his gloves and sword. "If you would like me to leave—"

"No," Cloud said. "It's alright. Stay."

He picked up the water and drained it in two gulps. He rinsed out the glass and set it on the drying rack, and he headed back into the hall. Glancing back at Sephiroth, he met and held mako-green eyes, open and bright, and he walked up the stairs to his room above.

After a moment, he heard Sephiroth follow.

* * *

Squall traced his fingertips along Rinoa's arm, wrapped over his chest.

It was almost uncomfortably hot under the covers, and he thought about pulling off his shirt, but that would involve moving Rinoa and hoping she didn't wake.

He closed his eyes, listening to the sound of the fans whirring in Balamb Garden's vents.

In the morning, he would face the cold possibility of never coming back.

In the night, he would lie still and let the heat wash over him.

* * *

"Daaaagger," Zidane said, dangling a bright red quill in front of her nose.

Garnet looked up and gasped, snatching the pen from his hand.

"Zidane, it's beautiful! Where did you get it?"

"Er..."

Garnet gave him a stern look, and he thought he would get a lecture again, but then she sighed and shook her head.

"Never mind. I'm just happy you're back."

There was a resounding crash out in the hall, and Zidane glanced at Garnet, his eyebrows dragging up to his hairline.

"It's probably Steiner. Beatrix is angry at him again, and he's moping around, walking into walls when he forgets which direction he was supposed to go."

Zidane grinned. "Mood swings, huh?"

"Shh, don't let her hear you say that."

There was a long wail, and Vivi ran into the room, arms outstretched. He ran into Zidane, wrapping his arms around Zidane's waist. "I don't want to!" he said.

Zidane scowled at Kuja. "What are you doing to him?"

Kuja sighed and crossed his arms, disgruntled. "I only wanted to do something about that ratty old hat. I fail to see why you louts are utterly set against any improvements."

Zidane sighed and rolled his eyes.

* * *

Tidus surfaced, taking in a deep breath and shaking back his hair.

"Okay, that was good!" he said, grinning at the Besaid kids who'd come running full tilt at him with a blitzball in hand and clamouring for a lesson. "But remember, don't use your ankle. Throw all your weight into your whole leg, and—"

A resounding whistle echoed over the water, which glittered in the lamp light.

"Ah, sorry," Tidus said. "I have to go."

One of the kids gave him a sly look, and he hauled the boy into a head lock, making him giggle and squirm.

Jecht was waiting at the edge of the beach with a smirk that wouldn't look out of place on a shark's face.

"So you think yer a trainer these days, huh?"

Tidus waved his hand dismissively at his father. "Hah. I'm the star player! Of course they want lessons."

"Well, imagine that. This team ain't wanting to win any more games or something?"

Tidus glared and considered punching in that smug face, but then Yuna was standing between them, hands on her hips.

"Are you two coming to eat or not? Lulu is making dinner especially for us, and if I have to eat her food, so will you."

"You mean 'choke it down'," Tidus muttered.

Judging by the suddenly innocent look on Jecht's face and Yuna's horrified expression, Lulu was standing behind him. Tidus plastered on a grin and turned around.

"Hey, Lulu! Is that dinner? It smells great!"

She looked entirely unimpressed, and Tidus cringed.

* * *

The portal was hazy in the glow of early dawn.

Terra took a deep breath, and she stepped forward. The window into another world tingled gently as she passed through, as if tiny raindrops had landed on her skin.

She opened her eyes, and she looked around.

She was the last one back, it seemed.

Squall nodded to her sharply, and Cloud almost smiled, Sephiroth standing at his back, looking around disinterestedly. Zidane and Bartz waved at her cheerfully before resuming playing a card game, and Kuja peered down at Bartz's cards. Firion smiled warmly, and Tidus grinned and stretched, lacing his hands behind his neck, while Jecht raised a large hand. Cecil looked up from sharpening his sword, and Golbez leaned against a tree, his arms crossed in front of his chest. The Warrior of Light looked at her steadily, his eyes bright in the new sunlight.

And there was Luneth, smiling widely and coming forward, raising his hands to take hers.

* * *

TBC


	6. Full Circle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 6. **Full Circle**
> 
> Disclaimers still apply.
> 
> Huh. This is just one big boss battle. Oh, and I hope you like French, because there's a lot of cheese coming your way. XD
> 
> I guess this is it, folks. Thank you so much to everyone who alerted, faved, reviewed, or read! It's been a blast, and I really enjoyed hearing what you had to say! I'm actually a bit misty-eyed about this all coming to an end, but I fully intend to continue with this fandom, and I hope to see all of you again!

The Chaos Shrine had fallen into greater disrepair over the years.

Luneth wondered what it had been constructed on, as areas of the ground had collapsed, leaving only thin walkways flanked by bottomless chasms. He peered down into the coiling mists and suppressed a shudder.

The Warrior of Light led them down a flight of stairs, edging carefully around steps that had crumbled into sand and small white shards of rock. They wound around the lower level, and Luneth shot Bartz a sympathetic look when they navigated gaping pits in the floor and he made a tiny, strangled whimper.

Two more levels down, the air had become cold and oppressive.

"Why is it so quiet?" Firion asked, suddenly. "We haven't been attacked once, and it's unlikely that Chaos doesn't know we're coming."

The Warrior of Light responded without looking back. "The Four Fiends once resided within this shrine. Common monsters feared them greatly and would not enter the lower levels."

"Garland's generals?"

"Yes. As they are already dead—"

"Hmph. All this waiting," Jecht said. "I woulda preferred a good fight."

Two more levels, the blank stone walls gave way to thick pillars. The walls around the centre space had collapsed on several sides, and in the middle, a squat, heavy throne stood.

It wasn't until they had approached close enough to feel the unnatural heat radiating from the occupant's body that the great horned head raised.

Glowing red eyes scanned them, and Luneth felt sick to his stomach.

"So," Chaos said, "you've come."

The Warrior of Light lifted his sword silently and pointed it at the god of discord.

"Oho? You believe you can defeat me? I have had fifty years to gather my powers, and you... You remain the puny insects that you were."

"We do not believe," said the Warrior of Light. "We know that we must. Each of us is here for a reason, fighting for that one thing which we cannot surrender."

Long, sharp teeth showed under Chaos' curved lips. "You fight because you must. How ironic." Chaos drew himself to his feet, towering over the warriors. "Has the war taught you nothing?"

Cecil's teeth clenched. "How did you survive? You were free, after the war. Why would you throw that away to restart the cycle?"

"I am a made thing, but before all of this, I was born from Garland's memories. As long as he lived, somewhere, I could be born again. I found him, but he, _he_ was content to live out his life as ruler of one kingdom. I will not be like him. _I will not shrivel and die like him!_ "

Terra flinched back at the sudden blast of sound from Chaos' roar.

There was a bright flash, a ripping noise, and a familiar shriek of laughter. Terra gasped, spinning around just in time to raise her arms and shield her face against the spinning fireball that caught her in the stomach and lifted her off her feet.

She bounced, rolling into a crouch, and glared up at Kefka's lopsided grin. Around her, she could see other portals splitting the air, and blurred figures shot out like arrows, ramming hard into her friends.

"Awwww," Kefka said. "Did you miss me?"

And then thunder magic speared down at her, and Terra threw herself to a side and rolled away desperately. Her lungs felt seared by the heat of the previous fireball, and she coughed when she drew in a shaky breath.

She leaped over another fire spell, and it was so hot that the air over it glazed and boiled. She gritted her teeth and refused to cry out when the heat clawed at her ankle and her skin cracked and blistered.

Terra watched, frustrated, as Kefka giggled and dodged her hasty Flare before immediately twisting away from the ice spell she had planted behind him. It caught bits of red cloth that ripped away and fluttered down the ground, but Kefka only grinned down at her.

She didn't notice the ice before it shattered against the floor and bounced up, slamming into her side, and she could only raise her hands as a shield. She bit off her scream viciously and whirled away from the spell.

Gasping for breath, Terra dragged herself to her feet. She didn't take her eyes away from Kefka.

He cocked his head, painted eyebrows waggling. "You don't actually think you can _beat_ me, do you?"

Terra drew in a deep breath and raised her hands, magic glowing in her palms. "Perhaps not," she said, "but for the sake of my friends, for everyone, I have to."

Lightning crackled and danced over the surfaces of the flurry of fireballs she sent blasting at Kefka, so fast that there was barely an arc to their trajectory.

Kefka dodged a few, and slapped away another until it slammed into the wall and dissipated. When the spells that he had dodged curved back and hurtled into his back, Terra saw him glance over his shoulder before he was engulfed in a deafening explosion. His shriek was high and sharp over the noise.

And then the mass of fire blew apart and wisped out as Kefka slashed a hand through it, and he snarled, diving down toward Terra before spinning in midair. Wings carved out of colour-shot magic speared out toward her.

Terra closed her eyes and braced herself. She wouldn't be able to dodge this, not after the hits she had taken.

Heavy cloth billowed and brushed against her raised arms.

Terra's eyes widened. She could see the longest points of the wings stabbing through the black armour in front of her. They retreated, tossing blood out into the air, and Kefka screamed when the heavy sword slash threw him back, tumbling in the air.

He caught his balance and looked back, a horrible scowl on his face.

"So," he spat the word out, "you fancy yourself a hero now, you brother complex?"

Golbez hmphed, pressing a glowing hand to the cracks in the armour on his chest. There was a sizzle and an unpleasant stink as he cauterized the wounds.

Kefka threw his hands forward and up, and a wave of explosions rocked the ground, travelling toward them. Suddenly, they blinked out.

Cecil was a blur of white, driving the clown up into the air before rearing up and slashing down.

"Thank you," Terra said quietly.

Golbez nodded curtly. Above them, Cecil attacked in a flurry of slashes, keeping Kefka off balance and barely giving him enough time to grunt at the impacts. Golbez leaped up into the air, arms raised, and gravity magic coalesced and dragged at Kefka.

Kefka struggled, his clothes ragged and dripping. He dug at the air with his arms and legs, almost as if he was swimming against the pull of Golbez's magic.

Terra pulled within herself, and the magic twisted and gathered into her hands. Orbs of holy magic shot toward Kefka, slamming into his body, and before the residue of the explosions had evaporated, Terra raised her hands up. Ultima glittered and spat, growing to engulf Kefka. The air shook, and it exploded outward, the blast driving Kefka into the floor. Cracks ran along the length of the stone path.

Terra watched the expanding cloud of smoke and dust, fighting for breath. She stumbled, and Cecil's hand was under her arm, strong and steady.

"Is it over?" he said.

Rubble fountained out, and Kefka was standing, arms out, nearly incandescent with rage.

He screamed, and Terra glanced up. A white field shimmered over her head like a window to somewhere else, and as she watched, burning bright magic dripped out and dropped down toward them. She jumped back, shoving Cecil to a side, and it burst on the ground, splattering acidic drops onto her arm.

Terra gathered power up in her hands while Cecil raised his sword, and then Golbez was standing in front of her, cape floating out when he thrust out his arm.

"Go!" Golbez snapped. "You must defeat Chaos! The fight will not end otherwise!"

"But brother—"

" _Go,_ Cecil!" Golbez stepped forward, black flames leaping up from his sword. "I am more than capable of handling this foul pierrot."

Cecil opened his mouth, gritted his teeth, and nodded. He turned, tugging on Terra's hand as he ran toward the central chamber.

Terra glanced back. Golbez and Kefka clashed in a burst of black and red fire.

* * *

Squall grunted, swinging the Lionheart quickly to parry the bolts of purple magic stabbing down at him. He slashed up, sending three bolts flying, and another one, hiding in the path of a previous spell, shot through his guard and embedded itself in his hip.

Squall gasped, staggering back.

Ultimecia smiled down at him, raising a hand. A black vortex appeared, holding in place, and Squall tensed.

"Who will help you this time?" Her voice never changed, smooth as ice, and black blades shot out at him.

Squall jumped and dodged, stepping up and off a wall, all the while twisting to keep Ultimecia in view. His gunblade's chain rattled against his wrist, held high as he tried to find an opening. He shot off a quick volley of fire spells, but Ultimecia swatted them away as if they were flies. She raised her other hand, her lips twisting.

Squall glanced down at the roiling portal under his feet, and he lunged away, ignoring the stab of pain in his side. Three spears of magic lanced up into the space where he had stood, and the sharp edge of one caught his arm and left a burning gash.

He twisted in midair, air burning blue around him as he charged at Ultimecia like a missile.

An enormous axe appeared in midair, spinning toward him, and he raised the Lionheart to block. It slammed into him, pushing him back, and an edge bit down into his shoulder.

With a growl, Squall flicked his gunblade hard and slung the attack away to crash into a wall and shower magic and rock dust all around him. His eyes widened, and he pulled the Lionheart in quickly, but not before a pair of magical bolts stabbed deep into his collar.

"And you?" Ultimecia said. "What are you fighting for?"

Sparks danced in the corners of Squall's vision, disorienting him, and for a moment, he thought he saw drifting white feathers.

He shook his head, raising the Lionheart up in front of his face. Light extended from its tip.

Ultimecia laughed. "Do you hope to succeed in using the same strategy twice?"

There was a flicker in the corner of his eye, and Squall saw the circle of runes race toward him, skimming along the ground. He tightened his grip on the gunblade. He wasn't going to be able to dodge all of it, not after everything.

There was a deafening roar by his ear, and black hair whipped into his face. Jecht leaped up, a massive boulder held over his shoulder, and he slung it downward, striking the magic circle and setting it off in a blast of light that just barely missed Squall's arm.

Ultimecia clicked her tongue. "Another mindless fool, racing to his death." She pulled an arm back, magic pooling black and oily around her hand, and she jolted and shrieked.

Tidus seemed to change direction in midair, flipping back and diving down for another flurry of attacks.

Squall looked up at Jecht, who rubbed at his shoulder and glanced back at him.

"Shaddup," Jecht grunted. "I don't need any more crying babies to deal with."

Jecht leaped into the air, shouting wildly and slashing, kicking, punching anything he could reach.

Tidus planted a foot against Ultimecia's back and propelled himself up and back, sending a hurtling ball of energy into the witch's head as he soared. Ultimecia faltered, tipping back and off balance.

Squall's lips twitched. He raised the blazing length of his engulfed gunblade high over his head.

"I wasn't gonna say anything," he said, and brought the beam of light down on Ultimecia, explosions rising up from below to meet it.

Squall stood still, listening to the sharp _plinks_ of cooling rock.

There was a low growl.

Magic ballooned up, swarming together and forming the shape of a planet, clouds swirling over the surface of miniature continents.

Squall gathered himself, waiting until it shot toward them, and he jumped up, knocking into Tidus and sending them both tumbling out of range of the blast. Tidus spun into a pillar and hooked a leg around it, sending him whirling back toward Ultimecia, glowing Caladbolg piercing forward.

Jecht raced past him with a wordless bellow, knocking Tidus aside and swinging his sword down in a barrage of attacks that left flashing afterimages. Ultimecia hurtled backward, smashing hard into a wall of crumbling stone.

Squall caught up to Tidus as he landed beside his father.

"What did you do that for?" Tidus protested.

Jecht gave Tidus an unreadable look. Then, he sneered, set a foot in Tidus's stomach, and he shoved.

Squawking, Tidus tumbled away.

" _Hey!_ "

"Go fight Chaos!" Jecht yelled, not turning back.

"What?"

"I ain't telling you twice! Go!"

Jecht raised his massive blade in one hand, tensing himself to charge.

Tidus stared after his father for a moment, and he turned. "Come on!" he shouted as he passed Squall on the way back to Chaos' throne.

Squall hesitated for a moment, and he followed, listening to Tidus's nasty mutters.

* * *

Luneth gasped, a hand scrabbling at the tentacle wrapped tightly around his neck. It constricted, crushing down, and Luneth hacked into it with a wild swing.

It loosened and pulled back, catching him with a stinging slap under the chin as it went.

Eyes watering, Luneth blinked furiously, darting in to strike quickly at the Cloud of Darkness's main body. He dodged back when a tentacle swung around, and he jumped, flipping in midair and summoning a rain of magical blades to stab down.

Tentacles whirled, slapping the attack away.

Luneth twisted sharply and ducked under black blasts of magic that spread out around him. He rushed in, slamming an ice spell down toward the Cloud of Darkness's head. Seeing a hint of movement, Luneth turned his head, and the fusillade of Particle Beam shots surged toward him, magic swamping over him.

Luneth dropped to the ground and skidded, breathing hard. He had managed to block the majority of the magical orbs with well-placed ice shrapnel, but a couple had slipped through. His arms felt like his skin had been burned off in places.

The Cloud of Darkness loomed over him, and a tentacle snapped at his face.

"Wai—wait!" Luneth said, throwing up his hands in front of him.

The Cloud of Darkness paused. Its face did not change, but Luneth could feel the smug air radiating from it.

"You wish for mercy from us, little boy?"

"I, well," Luneth stammered, stepping back. The Cloud of Darkness followed, floating closer. "Actually," Luneth said, "I just wanted to tell you—"

He jumped up and back as the roar of fire surrounded the Cloud of Darkness. A circle of fire spells had detonated, almost in unison.

"—that you're walking into a trap!"

He sent several spheres of lightning shooting out and forward, catching the Cloud of Darkness in the chest and tossing it into the air, following it quickly with a thunderous Flare.

The Cloud of Darkness shouted hoarsely, smoking as it fell to the ground, and Luneth sighed, wiping at his neck. He ached all over from the strain of holding back those Firaga spells. He looked up.

The Cloud of Darkness had vanished.

Holding his breath tensely, Luneth peered around.

Suddenly, a voice screamed in his head, telling him to jump, and Luneth dove to a side. The blast sent him flying, the acrid scent of the Cloud of Darkness's Particle Beam clinging to him, and his head smashed into the stone wall.

Groaning, he slid down to a seated position. Pillars of black light shot toward him, moving in a crooked line, and he threw himself out of its path. A trickle of blood rolled down his forehead and tickled his ear.

The Cloud of Darkness hovered out of reach, its tentacles snapping and straining to bite him.

"We will not fall for the same trick again!" it snarled.

Luneth cursed softly. He didn't think he could move for a while, let alone bridge the gap between them and launch another attack.

Then, he saw her.

Terra danced backward, Holy magic flying from her small hands, her face hard and set.

Luneth gritted his teeth, pressing his back against the wall behind him as he levered himself up. They were going to get out of this together. They'd agreed. He would not be left behind!

He shifted to ninja class, taking up a katana in each hand, and he glared at the Cloud of Darkness. It watched him calmly, as if examining an interesting insect.

Shouting, he ran towards it.

His breath caught in his throat. The walkway shuddered under his feet and crumbled, dropping chunks of rock down into the void below. He slipped, and he fell, reaching out with a desperate hand to grab at the receding ledge at the lip of the pit.

A gloved hand closed over his wrist, unyieldingly strong, and his shoulder wrenched in its socket.

He bit back a pained yelp, and he looked up into Sephiroth's glowing green eyes.

Sephiroth pulled him up with no visible sign of effort and dropped him onto solid ground. Behind the Soldier, Luneth could see Cloud bearing down in the Cloud of Darkness with a crushing two-handed slash, straining against the tentacles twisted in front of it to block.

Luneth dug his fingers into his shoulder and rotated the protesting joint.

"Thank you," he said.

"Hm."

Cloud twisted around, breaking away from the tentacles, and he slashed upward. The Cloud of Darkness flew backward, black liquid streaming from a gash in its chest.

Sephiroth leaped, and dust spun in little eddies in the wake of his path. Luneth saw his sword flash, and the Cloud of Darkness jolted as if hit by strikes in all directions, and it sagged and toppled toward the ground. Luneth ran forward, jumping up and into a whirlwind spin. His last slash cut deep into the Cloud of Darkness's back and sent it tumbling off the walkway.

Luneth looked down over the edge cautiously. He couldn't see anything.

The solid front of the Particle Beam roared up into his face, and he threw himself backward, feeling the small hairs on his cheek singe.

The Cloud of Darkness rose slowly over the edge of the pit, staring straight at him, and the tentacles spun and launched out like whips.

Luneth stood, swords held crossed in front of him. He was ready.

Cloud glanced down and caught his eye, nodding firmly. He raised the Buster Sword in a two handed guard.

Then, Luneth was looking at Sephiroth's back. The long silver hair was darkened with dust and blood.

"I will handle this," Sephiroth said.

"Don't be stupid," Cloud said quickly. "It'd be a lot easier if we—"

Sephiroth cut him off with a sharp slashing motion of the Masamune. He turned his head slightly, and Luneth could see the unnatural glow of an eye.

"It is not pity that moves me, you who do not understand anything."

Luneth saw Cloud flinch as if shot. Slowly, the Buster blade lowered.

Cloud turned, slinging his sword over his shoulder.

"Come on," he said to Luneth. "We have to end this." He walked away without looking back once.

Luneth followed, and he thought he might have seen a small smirk on Sephiroth's face.

* * *

Firion shot off a volley of arrows, piercing through the mines that the Emperor had set all around him. Pulling out his axe, he flung it forward, and he lunged, sword in hand, to the other side, where the Emperor would need to dodge.

Light flashed when he put his foot down, and he glanced down at the trap, cursing through gritted teeth. Lightning jolted up through the floor, and his muscles clenched up, unable to move.

The Emperor walked slowly forward, a smug smile on his face, and he waved his staff. A bright white crest drew itself in the air, and Firion could only watch as glowing projectiles shot out toward him.

The force of the impact knocked him off of the thunder trap, and his shoulder rammed into the wall.

A spark flared under him, and Firion pushed himself up and over the mines that flickered into sight and exploded under him. The shockwave knocked him off balance, and Firion thudded to the ground.

Coughing and trying to catch his breath, Firion looked up. The Emperor's golden armour clanked as he stepped forward.

"It is over," he said. "It is time for me to drag you to hell."

Firion saw the glow of the runes surrounding the Emperor, lying at his feet, and he curled in just as the blasts of fire began raining down on him. He heard the roar of the meteor descending, and he braced himself.

The explosions began, but the sounded strangely far away.

Firion looked up and saw Kuja standing over him, magic glowing brightly in his hands. Holy magic gained strength as it grew, and it spat and ate at the meteor, crumbling it in midair.

The Emperor snarled, slashing his staff in the air, but Zidane danced around the blow and spun, the Sargatanas joined and whirling in his hands. Lightning speared down, surrounding the Emperor, and a burst of water welled up and slammed the Emperor up into the air.

Kuja stepped forward, and he swung his arm. Flares welled up and engulfed the Emperor, sending him free-falling as they exploded.

Firion summoned every weapon he carried, and he threw them forward, the force of his strikes sending a whirlwind spinning down the centre of the ring of weapons that caught at the Emperor's body and slashed deep as it enveloped him.

The Emperor shuddered and fell to the ground. Shreds of gold spun as they clattered down.

The burns of Firion's arms ached and cracked when he moved, but he ignored them, drew his bow, and aimed it at the Emperor.

"Think he's dead?" Zidane asked, cocking his head beside Firion.

"I'm not sure."

Then, two spheres of Flare magic hovered in the air, and the Emperor had vanished.

Firion shot an arrow through one, and Zidane leaped up and kicked forward, sending a ring of fireballs barrelling into the second spell. They blew, sending streamers of magic into the air.

The Emperor's laugh echoed through the hall. "I will not lose! There is but one ruler in this land," he said. The Emperor floated down into view, pointing his staff at Firion's throat. "And I am he."

Firion gripped his spear, tensing himself to spring.

"Such pride," Kuja said, his voice dripping with disdain, "can only come before a fall." He stepped in front of Zidane, tapping the fingertips of one hand against his cheek. Kuja smirked, and he snapped the fingers of his free hand. The air between him and the Emperor exploded sharply, knocking aside the Emperor's staff, and Kuja dashed forward, flare magic bursting out and hurtling toward the Emperor.

"What are you doing, Kuja?" Zidane shouted over the rumbling of attack magic.

"Tch." Kuja looked at him askance. "Do you not have your own battle to fight?"

"But—"

"Do not presume to worry about me." Rings of Holy formed around Kuja and whirled off. He grinned savagely, and Firion had never seen him resemble Zidane so much. "It is the providence of nature that the strong survive."

Zidane hesitated, and then he nodded, shoving Firion ahead of him as he dashed off. "Don't forget!" he called back over his shoulder, "We have somewhere we have to return to!"

* * *

The Warrior of Light ducked under Chaos' claws as he swiped, and he threw his shield up and forward, spinning it as it approached Chaos' face. The god of discord leaned backward, letting the subsequent sword slashes pass harmlessly in front of his head.

Fireballs leaped toward him, and the Warrior of Light raised his shield and sword, crossing them in front of his face. They knocked him backward, and he flipped over as he fell, landing in a skid but keeping his feet.

Quickly, he stabbed his sword downward into the ground, and a wave of light shot toward Chaos.

Laughing, Chaos slashed a hand through the attack, and it fizzled and blinked out.

"Is this the best that you can do? Come, I will grant you a free attack."

The Warrior of Light frowned, and he dashed forward, jumping up to slam his shield down toward Chaos' head. Without pausing, he drew level and slashed, a flurry of strikes cutting at Chaos. The last slash threw Chaos down toward the ground, but the god spread his arms and drifted to a halt.

The Warrior of Light narrowed his eyes. Not a scratch. Had Chaos truly grown so strong that he could not be cut?

"Light!"

He glanced down.

Terra was looking up at him, eyes shining with determination. She raised her hands, and the roar of Ultima filled the chamber. It crawled over Chaos, buffeting him and knocking him into the path of Firion's light arrow, which pierced and lodged in a massive shoulder. Tidus slammed down with both feet on Chaos' back before hopping up, sparks of energy boring down where he had jumped. Luneth hung in midair over Chaos, raising both blades and stabbing them down toward Chaos' neck.

Chaos snarled, spinning and slashing out with his tail. It caught Luneth and Tidus, hurling them down to the ground. Their bodies bounced and slid on the rough rock, and there was the snap of something giving.

Squall spun in the air, explosions following in the wake of his gunblade and bursting against Chaos' horned head. Cecil slammed his sword into the ground next to the Warrior of Light, sending pillars of black flame roaring up to engulf Chaos. Zidane slashed down toward Chaos' head, his Sargatanas a blur of speed, and he swung himself backward, throwing the knives toward Chaos. Blinding beams of energy pierced at Chaos. Cloud leaped high, the Buster Sword blazing orange, and he slashed and dived, bearing Chaos down toward the ground with him.

Chaos twisted and roared, trying to regain his footing as he plummeted.

The Warrior of Light swung his sword in a wide arc, and magical blades fanned out before him, hanging in the air before shooting forward and piercing straight into Chaos' chest.

Chaos jerked, sailing backward in a curving arc.

It started low, a deep rumble that sent shivers down his spine, and it grew and grew until the roar threatened to deafen the warriors.

Chaos halted his fall and turned, leaning forward. His fists clenched, and blasts of hellfire surrounded him like a corona.

"Fools!" he raged, and he blinked out of sight, appearing immediately again in front of Squall. He slashed down with his claws, blood splashing to the ground, and Squall hit the ground hard enough to leave a shallow crater. He spun, claws and tail striking Cloud and Zidane out of the air and slamming them downward. He vanished again, reappearing high up in the air, and he raised his glowing hands.

Huge fiery swords rained down.

* * *

The pain was a thick, slow-moving thing, supporting him easily as he floated across the surface. He thought he was dead, and everything had been cut away: senses, emotions...

"Is the dream ending?"

The voice echoed.

He heard it often in his dreams, that voice. _Cosmos_.

The Warrior of Light drew in a ragged breath, choking on the blood running down his throat. He coughed, turned onto his side, and retched. Warm, coppery spit ran down the side of his mouth, and he wiped it away. Then, he opened his eyes.

He winced, holding his burned arm, and he looked around.

His allies lay still, strewn across the floor. Tidus stirred, groaned, and fell silent again.

The marks of the flaming swords were etched across their bodies, and blood dripped slowly, sluggishly.

Swaying, the Warrior of Light pushed himself to his feet. He held up his sword and his shield, and he looked up at Chaos.

The god of discord sneered down at him, baring sharp fangs. Firelight flickered all around them, and the air smelled of smoke and sulphur. "You still stand," Chaos said. "You are too late. Your comrades lie dying around you, and those you left behind to fight..."

The Warrior of Light twisted and looked beyond the rubble that had once been the wall surrounding the throne room.

It was silent. He could not see the enemy warriors, but those he called allies were not visible, either. There, lying deathly still, may have been a gloved hand, stretching up and reaching out.

"They will be dead soon, without any need for interference," Chaos said.

A flicker, and he was gone. The Warrior of Light was already raising his sword to block when Chaos appeared directly in front of him. He reared up, and he slashed down with razor-sharp claws. The Warrior of Light caught the attack on the sharp edge of his sword, and he strained to throw Chaos off.

A crack appeared in his blade, and his eyes widened in alarm. There was another sharp crack, and his sword shattered, Chaos' claws slicing through the metal and into his chest.

The Warrior of Light staggered, dropping to one knee.

Chaos' laughter echoed through the chamber,

The Warrior of Light hissed, pressing a hand hard against the heavy bleeding seeping through his armour and over his clothing. He could see Chaos above him, great black wings spread wide in the air. The wings pounded once, and they folded. Chaos plummeted down toward him in a sharp dive, and the blast of a triumphant bellow pressed down on the Warrior of Light like a solid weight. Chaos reached out a clawed hand.

He struggled to stand.

"Light!"

The Warrior of Light jerked his head around. Terra was awake now, staring in horror as he crouched under Chaos' charge, unable to move.

"Shield!" Terra screamed, stretching her hand forward, toward him.

The Warrior of Light looked down at his shield, lying at his side. It would not be enough. The shield could not stop Chaos. Then, he saw the glimmer of Terra's magic, weaving over the metal. A flicker of movement caught his eye, and he saw Cloud push himself up on shaking arms. Power, a soft green river, flowed from his raised hand, swirling around the Warrior of Light before sinking inward.

Rustles sounded from around him. He saw Tidus glow bright before tiny tendrils of light, tailed like dancing comets, spun into the air and approached him. Zidane exhaled sharply, and a thick, gentle mist drifted forward. Cecil, Firion, Luneth, Bartz, and Squall, too: they watched him, and their power filled him until he felt like bursting. Warmth, laughter, determination, uncertainty, focus. He felt them all. He expelled the breath in his lungs hard and snatched up the shield, bringing it up to block.

This was it.

Chaos impacted, and the shield flashed blinding white, throwing out spinning triangles of light bigger than he had ever seen before. The magic wobbled, steadied, and grew higher and higher. He could feel it under his hands. Everyone had poured their power into the shield, and it had caught and enveloped them all. Chaos strained, unable to break through, and unable to pull back.

The Warrior of Light yelled, bracing himself and pushing, and the light concentrated and stabbed forward in a massive white surge. It pierced Chaos, blasting through and out his whole body. He thought he saw a gauntlet shatter, and a great dragon roared out, coiling and climbing up into the air. It paused in the sky high above, looking down at them silently, and then it flew away.

Chaos bounced back onto the ground. His flesh began cracking, light streaming out from under his now bark-like skin. The cracks quickly multiplied, strained and boiled, and Chaos exploded, screaming, in a blast that felt as if it had taken the flesh off their bones.

* * *

When Cloud opened his eyes again, the decrepit, decaying Chaos Shrine had vanished, leaving gleaming white stone surrounding them on all sides.

They had moved, it seemed.

Up ahead, the entrance to the central chamber was sealed, and in front of the door, three figures stood, staring back at them.

They glowed from within, somehow, and they were almost too bright to look at.

By his side, an answering glow flickered and grew.

Cloud glanced up, wincing at the strain the movement put on his blistering wounds, and he saw the Warrior of Light step forward. The knight's armour glittered harshly in the light emanating from the Warrior of Light's body.

He looked again toward the door, realization dawning.

The Warrior of Light dressed in a White Wizard's robe nodded toward the Knight. "What took you?"

The Black Wizard crossed his arms. "We thought we would need to fight Chaos without you."

The Knight bowed his head. "Forgive me. I had to settle a matter elsewhere."

The Master said, "And now? You are ready?"

"Yes. In a moment." He turned to Cloud, and to the others watching him steadily. "I believe... we may have been caught in the cycle all that time. I believe it is now broken, but we have exited at the beginning, before Garland created the time loop. And so, as such, our fights have not yet happened."

The white hallway was silent as the warriors thought, and they understood.

"We don't want to fight anymore," Tidus said softly.

Air flickered, and portals to each of their worlds appeared behind them. There were shadows in the portals, boiling and twisting. Several took on familiar shapes. The Emperor stared, waiting for Firion and watching through the gateway. Kefka giggled and beckoned, curling a finger toward Terra. Ultimecia crossed her arms behind Squall, and wine red lips curved in Edea's pale face.

"I am sorry," said the Knight. "You will not remember."

There was a flash of light.

Everyone was gone, leaving only the four Warriors of Light.

The Knight frowned, but he shook his head. He did not hope.

* * *

The Warrior of Light stirred, and he woke, pulling himself up onto his hands and knees. Water drifted and lapped around his fingers. He grasped his sword, leaning heavily on it as he stumbled to his feet. He looked up. The greyness of the land stretched out as far as his eyes could see, the occasional flashes of light like the trails of stars soaring into the grey sky.

"Sanctuary," he said, quietly.

Someone shifted behind him, and there was a clink of armour and the rustle of cloth.

The Warrior of Light turned around.

It was... everyone.

His comrades stood under the greyness of the horizon. Terra and Luneth stood side by side to his right. He had that childish grin, looking for all the world as if he knew something that no one else did. Terra raised a hand and waved shyly. Tidus had his sword resting over both shoulders, smiling so widely that it was surprising his head did not split in two. Cecil seemed to glow white in the mist, like the light of the moon. Everyone.

And behind them... Golbez stood stoically, his eyes a hint of a glitter behind his helmet. Jecht rotated a shoulder nonchalantly. Kuja gave him a disdainful look before running his fingers through his hair with a flourish.

"What—?" The Warrior of Light said, and stopped.

Cosmos glittered gold behind the warriors. She smiled softly.

"I told you," said Tidus.

The Warrior of Light looked at him uncertainly.

"I told you we would stop the cycle."

The Warrior of Light's eyes widened. He swept his gaze over the assembled crowd again. Squall gave a curt nod when their eyes met briefly. Garland hmphed, crossing his arms and half-turning his body to stare off into the distance. He glanced back at the Warrior of Light, and he shifted awkwardly.

"We're done fighting," Tidus said.

The Warrior of Light took a step forward. Cloud gave him the reserved half-smile that seemed to be his only method of dealing with situations he couldn't resolve with his giant Buster. Sephiroth glanced at him, looked mildly amused, and made a complicated gesture with the Masamune that caused Cloud to roll his eyes. He was not sure he wanted to know. The secrets those two kept could bury a kingdom.

"How?" he said, finally.

"There are some memories that resonate too deeply within us to vanish," said Firion. The wild rose was a splash of colour in his upraised hand. "What we went through together..."

"We'll never forget," concluded Bartz.

Zidane laced his fingers behind his head. "We remember everything, and we don't want to fight anymore."

There was a strange feeling bubbling in his chest, and when the Warrior of Light let it out, a huff of a laugh sounded loud in the silent world.

"My friends," he said. Garland gave him a strange look.

Ahh. The word tasted right.

"My friends. Thank you."

 

 

End.


End file.
